As it turns out, there is more to the story about the anti-terrorism task force’s visit to the family who was suspiciously Googling backpacks and pressure cookers.
The Google searches were the basis for the visit, but the former employer of Michelle Catalano’s husband was the person who put the searches together and thought, “Wow, these people must be terrorists.”
It also seems, according to Catalano’s clarification, that the men who searched the home and questioned her husband, wanted the family to believe that they had this omnipotent power to catalogue their searches.
We found out through the Suffolk Police Department that the searches involved also things my husband looked up at his old job. We were not made aware of this at the time of questioning and were led to believe it was solely from searches from within our house.
I did not lie or make it up. I wrote the piece with the information that was given. What was withheld from us obviously could not be a part of a story I wrote based on what happened yesterday.
The Suffolk County Police Department issued a statement as well.
Suffolk County Criminal Intelligence Detectives received a tip from a Bay Shore based computer company regarding suspicious computer searches conducted by a recently released employee. The former employee’s computer searches took place on this employee’s workplace computer. On that computer, the employee searched the terms “pressure cooker bombs” and “backpacks.”
After interviewing the company representatives, Suffolk County Police Detectives visited the subject’s home to ask about the suspicious internet searches. The incident was investigated by Suffolk County Police Department’s Criminal Intelligence Detectives and was determined to be non-criminal in nature.
Any further inquiries regarding this matter should be directed to the Suffolk County Police Department.
As seems to be the frequent case lately, the so-called answers lead to more questions.
Why would an average person look at someone’s searches and feel the need to tip off the police? The media frenzy over the Boston Bombing, with all of the subsequent finger-pointing, has triggered a mass hysteria reminiscent of that which caused a school to suspend a little boy for biting his Pop-Tart into the shape of a gun shortly after the Sandy Hook school shooting. It’s like a kid who watches a scary movie before bed – suddenly, every noise becomes scary and every shadow suspicious. The press has created an atmosphere of fear and mistrust. We’ve been purposely divided and it is only a matter of time before this allows us to be conquered.
Why would the police mislead the family to cause them to think that they were victims of the overreaching powers of the NSA? More and more, we are seeing shocking Youtube videos and reading alternative media reports about cops who abuse their authority. In this police state rising, many “authorities” seem to enjoy intimidating people and creating and atmosphere of subjugation.
What can we take away from this?
1.) Nothing that you do on the internet is private (especially on a work computer).
Information can be collected and reassembled to paint any picture wanted. Yesterday, I quoted Cardinal Richelieu: “If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged.”
2.) Citizens have succumbed to a media-fueled mass hysteria. And if they aren’t hysterical and just want revenge on a former employee, the mass hysteria made that a whole lot easier too.
3.) Google will rat you out one a dime and sing like a canary on crack. Alexis Tsotsis from Tech Crunch wrote:
While Google’s, or PRISM‘s, tracking of Internet activity wasn’t behind this incident, the fact is that Google does comply with law enforcement to hand over user data in general. Can the FBI or local police provide a search warrant to Google, and would Google possibly comply with such a request? Yes, and the company publishes all requests in a report every six months. This is nothing new.
And wider requests, like for the months of search history that would be needed to figure out the pressure cooker and backpack coincidence, may result in a push to narrow the scope of the investigation from Google’s end.
4.) Cops mislead and intimidate people.
If it adds to the intimidation factor and gets people to comply, it appears that police officers have no problem fueling people’s fear. I have no doubt in my mind that the police in this situation wanted the family to believe they had been NSAd. Most people are going to be a whole lot more compliant if they think that everything they have done in the past 6 months could be reassembled to paint a picture of them as terrorists. “Sure, please search my house and allow me to prove I haven’t done anything wrong.” The family in this situation was not given the whole story, and I believe that was done purposely.
An Atmosphere of Suspicion
What has been created is an atmosphere of suspicion.
- Folks are suspicious of their co-workers and neighbors.
- Because of the fear that has been fueled, a completely innocent action can be paired with another innocent action and make anyone look like a terrorist.
- We are rightfully suspicious of the surveillance state.
- People in authority milk these suspicions for all they are worth and use them to control us.
According to Claire Wolfe, this is a step towards the corruption of our culture:
Think of East Germany under the STASI or the old Soviet Union. Literally husbands couldn’t trust their wives. Parents couldn’t trust their children. Brothers couldn’t trust brothers because so many were reporting to the state. Now, some countries that knew the horror of snitch culture forbid or limit the use of snitches. At the same time, formerly free nations are relying on snitches for everything and encouraging every moron in the land to “see something and say something.”
We’re being divided, intimidated and controlled. And make no mistake…it’s deliberate.
Daisy, absolute truth. Control freaks, cowboys, most on an ego mania trip. ooo luv that power, to push people around.
I’m from Texas, and I can guarantee you that real cowboys are not like that.
Why believe the “Local Cops” story? Who do you think ultimately runs them ? NSA doesn’t need this egg on their face now.
P.S. never be afraid to stand up for your God given rights. Demand identification, to see the search warrant and refuse entry if one doesn’t exist.
There’s a reason when more than one goon visits you, and it’s not for their protection, it for corroboration of what ever you may say. So don’t say anything.
Faithfully
Don
Die free of live as a slave
By a strange coincidence, isn’t today the “Google Search for Pressure Cookers and Backpacks” Day?
Never believe anything a cop says. Never say anything to the cops without your lawyer present.
And never dial 911
I’m not very computer literate – but I’ve used Start Page (free) and their search engine (not google) for years – See below their home page – there must be other private sites out there too
“…Start Page
the world’s most private search engine
Add to Firefox | Set as homepage
© 2013 – Privacy
Take a deep breath. You’re safe here.
Click here to learn how StartPage protects you from government surveillance…”
But can you be really sure about that?
Good point – however, for the couple of years I’ve been using it – their stated mission has been privacy against government snooping – seems they are ahead of the curve at least.
In response to Freemanontheland – from the Start Page site:
“…StartPage and its sister search engine Ixquick have in their 14-year history never provided a single byte of user data to the US government, or any other government or agency. Not under PRISM, nor under any other program in the US, nor under any program anywhere in the world.
Here’s how we are different:
StartPage does not store any user data. We make this perfectly clear to everyone, including any governmental agencies. We do not record the IP addresses of our users and we don’t use tracking cookies, so there is literally no data about you on our servers to access. Since we don’t even know who our customers are, we can’t share anything with Big Brother. In fact, we’ve never gotten even a single request from a governmental authority to supply user data in the fourteen years we’ve been in business.
StartPage uses encryption (HTTPS) by default. Encryption prevents snooping. Your searches are encrypted, so others can’t “tap” the Internet connection to snoop what you’re searching for. This combination of not storing data together with using strong encryption for the connections is key in protecting your Privacy.
Our company is based in The Netherlands, Europe. US jurisdiction does not apply to us, at least not directly. Any request or demand from ANY government (including the US) to deliver user data, will be thoroughly checked by our lawyers, and we will not comply unless the law which actually applies to us would undeniably require it from us. And even in that hypothetical situation, we refer to our first point; we don’t even have any user data to give. We will never cooperate with voluntary spying programs like PRISM.
StartPage cannot be forced to start spying. Given the strong protection of the Right to Privacy in Europe, European governments cannot just start forcing service providers like us to implement a blanket spying program on their users. And if that ever changed, we would fight this to the end.
Privacy. It’s not just our policy, it’s our mission…”
Knowing there are options out there, hopefully, will help fellow patriots – NOMI
My parents are European and lived through WWII. They came to the US after the Soviets invaded their homeland and confiscated their homes, businesses and all property. To this day, my mother doesn’t trust anyone even family members. The police state damaged her psyche. My Dad on the other hand put it behind him. He actually trusted people too much by way of compensation. Most Americans have no idea how horrific and traumatic it is to live under a socialist/communist/police state. But they’re fixing to find out.
from one police state to another? i commiserate with your mother.
I am now way past being old. Growing up my parents would say “Do not do or say anything that will call attention to you or the family.” My wife does like for me to use the internet very much with the remember “What they did to our families in the past.”
The absolute best policy in dealing with any police nowadays is:
1) Say nothing. Answer no questions at all.
2) Demand a search warrant.
3) Stick to #1 and #2 no matter what they tell you.
Remember that Martha Stewart was sent to prison not for illegal activities, but for ‘making false statements to a federal officer.’ She wasn’t under oath and her ‘false statement’ was to deny doing something that was not unlawful to do. Get it? She actually did do the thing she denied doing, and had she admitted doing it, she could not have been prosecuted because in was not an unlawful act. But she denied doing it, which was her ‘false statement’, and the prosecutors had to nail her hide to the shed for something, so that was it.
Require the warrant. Keep the cop outside until he produces one. Any “search” without a warrant is expressly intended to find evidence supporting one … it’s a fishing expedition. Once they find something actionable, it will be named on the warrant.
Don’t be rude. Don’t threaten even if the cop does. But don’t open the door. If you open the door after you answer the knock (you actually got a knock?), it counts as an invitation to enter. Talk through the storm door. If you don’t have one, this is your clue. Use it.
You cannot “prove” innocence to a cop looking for evidence that proves guilt. He is NEVER looking for proof of innocence: he’s looking for evidence of a crime (however flimsy).
The best that can happen is for him/her to come up empty … this time.
But that implies that you don’t read web sites like this one, own a firearm that could somehow be painted as an “assault weapon” (or a suspicious amount of ammunition, such as two boxes of finished cartridges, or reload your own, requiring you to keep primers and powder on hand “bomb making materials”), keep a copy of the Constitution on your desk or engage in other nefarious activities such as home canning, gardening or backpacking. God forbid you should be a member of the NRA, go to church regularly and volunteer for the Community Watch.
In fact, may God help anyone who attempts to take an active part in life. Richelieu was right.