LOS ANGELES — An incredible report has surfaced revealing that police have been using what they called “Stringrays on steroids” for over a decade.
A Stingray is an invasive device that mimics a cell phone tower, causing phones in its vicinity to connect to it.
Once phones are connected to the Stingray, whoever is controlling the Stingray has the ability to scoop data from the phones and gather intelligence.
Everything from text messages to private photos and banking information is thought to be detectable by Stingrays.
It has prompted many activists to either ditch their phones completely or invest in phone shielding systems, such as a Tunneling system.
Tunneling one’s phone at key times, such as during protests or other high risks activities, enables users to “drop off the grid” and return to it at their own discretion and timing, rendering tracking technologies virtually useless.
This is achieved by a conductor system that effectively shields out EMF (electro-magnetic frequencies).
Aside from Stingrays, it turns out that police have also been using what are called DRT boxes (short for Digital Receiver Technology, Inc..
DRT boxes are mounted on low-flying aircraft and used to intercept the calls and gather the data of hundreds of mobile phone users nearly simultaneously.
DRT boxes (sometimes called “Dirtboxes”) were used by the US Military and the NSA originally.
But we now know that police in Chicago and Los Angeles purchased them in no-bid contracts, according to reports.
The Center for Investigative Reporting discovered that Chicago and Los Angeles police have been using dirt boxes since 2005. They report the following:
In Chicago, the Digital Receiver Technology equipment was purchased in 2005 with funds collected in asset forfeiture cases. In Los Angeles, the police department purchased a package of Digital Receiver Technology equipment with $260,000 in homeland security grant funding. The sole-source purchase was approved unanimously by the Los Angeles City Council in 2005. Both departments also use StingRays, a more commonly known cell-site simulator manufactured by the Florida-based Harris Corp.
Oftentimes protesters have found that police are able to track their locations “mysteriously” — we now know it’s because police were using Stingrays to track their locations via their unprotected phones being carried on their persons.
The use of Stingrays to snoop on our cell phone data is considered an egregious violation of the 4th amendment by many, and some legislators are planning to inhibit their use by law enforcement without a warrant.
Alan Grayson is an example:
U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Florida, who is on the House Foreign Affairs and Science, Space and Technology committees, said the use of technology with eavesdropping capabilities without a warrant is “a clear violation of the Fourth Amendment.”
By using such technology without informing judges of the full capabilities of these devices, Grayson said, law enforcement officials are exposing their casework to appeals under the exclusionary rule, which mandates that evidence gathered illegally cannot be used in court proceedings.
“They’re essentially messing up every case they use these devices in,” he said.
