Lifeboat Foundation News Blog: Law Enforcement

Archive for the ‘law enforcement’ category: Page 23

Dec 9, 2013

Cellphone surveillance: A new tool in police arsenal to combat crime

Posted by Seb in categories: law enforcement, mobile phones, privacy, surveillance

Written by John Kelly USA Today

The National Security Agency isn’t the only government entity secretly collecting data from people’s cellphones. Local police are increasingly scooping it up, too.

Armed with new technologies, including mobile devices that tap into cellphone data in real time, dozens of local and state police agencies are capturing information — about thousands of cellphone users at a time, whether they are targets of an investigation or not, according to public records obtained by USA Today, The Des Moines Register and other Gannett newspapers and TV stations.

The records, from more than 125 police agencies in 33 states, reveal:

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Dec 2, 2013

Law Banning 3D-Printed Guns Up for Crucial Vote

Posted by Seb in categories: 3D printing, defense, engineering, government, law enforcement, open access, policy

By Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was speaking at a government function in July when a man sitting a few rows behind him pulled a Liberator, the infamous 3D-printed gun that the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) recently defined as a “lethal weapon.”

The gun posed no real danger. The man bearing it was just a TV reporter trying to prove how easy it is to sneak a 3D-printed plastic gun past security checks that include metal detectors.

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Dec 2, 2013

Spoils of war: Police getting leftover Iraq trucks

Posted by Seb in categories: government, law enforcement, policy, security

By MICHAEL VIRTANEN
Associated Press

QUEENSBURY, N.Y. (AP) — Coming soon to your local sheriff: 18-ton, armor-protected military fighting vehicles with gun turrets and bulletproof glass that were once the U.S. answer to roadside bombs during the Iraq war.

The hulking vehicles, built for about $500,000 each at the height of the war, are among the biggest pieces of equipment that the Defense Department is giving to law enforcement agencies under a national military surplus program.

For police and sheriff’s departments, which have scooped up 165 of the mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles, or MRAPS, since they became available this summer, the price and the ability to deliver shock and awe while serving warrants or dealing with hostage standoffs was just too good to pass up.

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