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Wiretapping, also known as wire tapping or telephone tapping, is the Surveillance of telephone and Internet-based conversations by a third party, often by covert means. The wire tap received its name because, historically, the monitoring connection was an actual electrical tap on an analog telephone or telegraph line. Legal wiretapping by a government agency is also called lawful interception. Passive wiretapping monitors or records the traffic, while active wiretapping alters or otherwise affects it.
The telephone call recording laws in most U.S. states require only one party to be aware of the recording, while twelve states require both parties to be aware. In Nevada, the state legislature enacted a law making it legal for a party to record a conversation if one party to the conversation consented, but the Nevada Supreme Court issued two judicial opinions changing the law and requiring all parties to consent to the recording of a private conversation for it to be legal. It is considered better practice to announce at the beginning of a call that the conversation is being recorded.
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects privacy rights by requiring a Search warrant to search a person. However, telephone tapping is the subject of controversy surrounding violations of this right. There are arguments that wiretapping invades a person's personal privacy and therefore violates their Fourth Amendment rights. On the other hand, there are certain rules and regulations, which permit wiretapping. A notable example of this is the Patriot Act, which, in certain circumstances, gives the government permission to wiretap citizens. In addition, wiretapping laws vary per state, making it even more difficult to determine whether the Fourth Amendment is being violated.
Legal protection extends to 'private communications' where the participants would not expect unintended persons to learn the content of the communication. A single participant can legally, and covertly record a conversation. Otherwise police normally need a judicial warrant based upon probable grounds to record a conversation they are not a part of. In order to be valid wiretap authorization must state: 1) the offense being investigated by the wiretap, 2) the type of communication, 3) the identity of the people or places targeted, 4) the period of validity (60 days from issue).
When telephone exchanges were mechanical, a tap had to be installed by technicians, linking circuits together to route the audio signal from the call. Now that many exchanges have been converted to digital technology, tapping is far simpler and can be ordered remotely by computer. This central office switch wiretapping technology using the Advanced Intelligent Network (AIN) was invented by Wayne Howe and Dale Malik at BellSouth's Advanced Technology R&D group in 1995 and was issued as US Patent #5,590,171. Telephone services provided by cable TV companies also use digital switching technology. If the tap is implemented at a digital switch, the switching computer simply copies the digitized bits that represent the phone conversation to a second line and it is impossible to tell whether a line is being tapped. A well-designed tap installed on a phone wire can be difficult to detect. In some places, some law enforcement may be able to even access a mobile phone's internal microphone even while it isn't actively being used on a phone call (unless the battery is removed or drained). The noises that some people believe to be telephone taps are simply crosstalk created by the coupling of signals from other phone lines.
Data on the calling and called number, time of call and duration, will generally be collected automatically on all calls and stored for later use by the invoice department of the phone company. These data can be accessed by security services, often with fewer legal restrictions than for a tap. This information used to be collected using special equipment known as and trap and trace devices and U.S. law still refers to it under those names. Today, a list of all calls to a specific number can be obtained by sorting billing records. A telephone tap during which only the call information is recorded but not the contents of the phone calls themselves, is called a pen register tap.
For telephone services via digital exchanges, the information collected may additionally include a log of the type of communications media being used (some services treat data and voice communications differently, in order to conserve bandwidth).
There are a number of ways to monitor telephone conversations. One of the parties may record the conversation, either on a tape or solid-state recording device, or they may use a computer running call recording software. The recording, whether overt or covert, may be started manually, automatically when it detects sound on the line (VOX), or automatically whenever the phone is off the hook.
The conversation may be monitored (listened to or recorded) covertly by a third party by using an induction coil or a direct electrical connection to the line using a beige box. An induction coil is usually placed underneath the base of a telephone or on the back of a telephone handset to pick up the signal inductively. An electrical connection can be made anywhere in the telephone system, and need not be in the same premises as the telephone. Some apparatus may require occasional access to replace batteries or tapes. Poorly designed tapping or transmitting equipment can cause interference audible to users of the telephone.
The tapped signal may either be recorded at the site of the tap or transmitted by radio or over the telephone wires. state-of-the-art equipment operates in the 30–300 GHz range to keep up with telephone technology compared to the 772 kHz systems used in the past. The transmitter may be powered from the line to be maintenance-free, and only transmits when a call is in progress. These devices are low-powered as not much power can be drawn from the line, but a state-of-the-art receiver could be located as far away as ten kilometers under ideal conditions, though usually located much closer. Research has shown that a satellite can be used to receive terrestrial transmissions with a power of a few milliwatts. Any sort of radio transmitter whose presence is suspected is detectable with suitable equipment.
Conversation on many early cordless telephones could be picked up with a simple radio scanner or sometimes even a domestic radio. Widespread digital spread spectrum technology and encryption has made eavesdropping increasingly difficult.
A problem with recording a telephone conversation is that the recorded volume of the two speakers may be very different. A simple tap will have this problem. An in-ear microphone, while involving an additional distorting step by converting the electrical signal to sound and back again, in practice gives better-matched volume. Dedicated, and relatively expensive, telephone recording equipment equalizes the sound at both ends from a direct tap much better.
It is also possible to get greater resolution of a phone's location by combining information from a number of cells surrounding the location, which cells routinely communicate (to agree on the next handoff—for a moving phone) and measuring the timing advance, a correction for the speed of light in the GSM standard. This additional precision must be specifically enabled by the telephone company—it is not part of the network's ordinary operation.
As technologies emerge, including VoIP, new questions are raised about law enforcement access to communications (see VoIP recording). In 2004, the Federal Communications Commission was asked to clarify how the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) related to Internet service providers. The FCC stated that “providers of broadband Internet access and voice over Internet protocol (“VoIP”) services are regulable as “telecommunications carriers” under the Act.” Those affected by the Act will have to provide access to law enforcement officers who need to monitor or intercept communications transmitted through their networks. As of 2009, warrantless surveillance of internet activity has consistently been upheld in FISA court.
The Internet Engineering Task Force has decided not to consider requirements for wiretapping as part of the process for creating and maintaining IETF standards.
Typically, illegal Internet wiretapping is conducted via Wi-Fi connection to someone's Internet by cracking the WEP or WPA key, using a tool such as Aircrack-ng or Kismet. Once in, the intruder relies on a number of potential tactics, for example an ARP spoofing attack, allowing the intruder to view packets in a tool such as Wireshark or Ettercap.
To the mobile phones in its vicinity, a device called an "IMSI-catcher" pretends to be a legitimate base station of the mobile phone network, thus subjecting the communication between the phone and the network to a man-in-the-middle attack. This is possible because, while the mobile phone has to authenticate itself to the mobile telephone network, the network does not authenticate itself to the phone. There is no defense against IMSI-catcher based eavesdropping, except using end-to-end call encryption; products offering this feature, , are already beginning to appear on the market, though they tend to be expensive and incompatible with each other, which limits their proliferation.
Webtapping is used to monitor websites that presumably contain dangerous or sensitive materials, and the people that access them. It is allowed in the US by the Patriot Act, but is considered a questionable practice by many.
The earliest wiretaps were extra wires — physically inserted to the line between the switchboard and the subscriber — that carried the signal to a pair of earphones and a recorder. Later, wiretaps were installed at the central office on the frames that held the incoming wires. In late 1940, the Nazis tried to secure some telephone lines between their forward headquarters in Paris and a variety of in Germany. They did this by constantly monitoring the voltage on the lines, looking for any sudden drops or increases in voltage indicating that other wiring had been attached. However, the French telephone engineer Robert Keller succeeded in attaching taps without alerting the Nazis. This was done through an isolated rental property just outside of Paris. Keller's group became known to SOE (and later Allied military intelligence generally) as "Source K". They were later betrayed by a mole within the French resistance, and Keller was murdered in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in April 1945. The first computerized telephone switch was developed by Bell Labs in 1965; it did not support standard wiretapping techniques.
Before the attack on Pearl Harbor and the subsequent entry of the United States into World War II, the U.S. House of Representatives held hearings on the legality of wiretapping for national defense. Significant legislation and judicial decisions on the legality and constitutionality of wiretapping had taken place years before World War II.United States Congress. Joint resolution to authorize the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the Department of Justice to con-duct investigations in the interests of national defense, and ·for that purpose to permit wire tapping in certain cases. H.J.Res. 571. 76th Cong. 2nd sess. House Committee on the Judiciary Rept. No. 2574. Cong. Rec. (bound) 8300 (June 14, 1940) However, it took on new urgency at that time of national crisis. The actions of the government regarding wiretapping for the purpose of national defense in the current war on terror have drawn considerable attention and criticism. In the World War II era, the public was also aware of the controversy over the question of the constitutionality and legality of wiretapping. Furthermore, the public was concerned with the decisions that the legislative and judicial branches of the government were making regarding wiretapping.United States Congress. An act to amend section 606 of the Communications Act of 1934 for the pur-pose of granting to the President, in time of war or threatened war, certain powers with respect to communications by wire. H.R. 6263. 77th Cong., 2nd sess. House Committee on the Judiciary.
On October 19, 1963, U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, who served under John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, authorized the FBI to begin wiretapping the communications of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The wiretaps remained in place until April 1965 at his home and June 1966 at his office. In 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that wiretapping (or “intercepting communications”) requires a warrant in Katz v. United States. In 1968 Congress passed a law that provided warrants for wiretapping in criminal investigations.
In the 1970s, optical fibers become a medium for telecommunications. These fiber lines, "long, thin strands of glass that carry signals via laser light," are more secure than radio and have become very cheap. From the 1990s to the present, the majority of communications between fixed locations has been achieved by fiber. Because these fiber communications are wired, they are protected under U.S. law.
In 1978, the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) created a "secret federal court" for issuing wiretap warrants in national security cases. This was in response to findings from the Watergate break-in, which allegedly uncovered a history of presidential operations that had used surveillance on domestic and foreign political organizations.
A difference between US wiretapping in the US and elsewhere is that, when operating in other countries, "American intelligence services could not place wiretaps on phone lines as easily as they could in the U.S." Also, in the US, wiretapping is regarded as an extreme investigative technique, while communications are often intercepted in some other countries. The National Security Agency (NSA) "spends billions of dollars every year intercepting foreign communications from ground bases, ships, airplanes and satellites".
FISA distinguishes between U.S. persons and foreigners, between communications inside and outside the U.S., and between wired and wireless communications. Wired communications within the United States are protected, since intercepting them requires a warrant, but there is no regulation of US wiretapping elsewhere.
In 1994, Congress approved the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), which “requires telephone companies to be able to install more effective wiretaps. In 2004, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), United States Department of Justice (DOJ), Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) wanted to expand CALEA requirements to VoIP service.”
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ruled in August 2005 that “broadband-service providers and interconnected VoIP providers fall within CALEA's scope. Currently, instant messaging, web boards and site visits are not included in CALEA's jurisdiction. In 2007 Congress amended FISA to "allow the government to monitor more communications without a warrant". In 2008 President George W. Bush expanded the surveillance of internet traffic to and from the U.S. government by signing a national security directive.
The NSA warrantless surveillance (2001–2007) controversy was discovered in December 2005. It aroused much controversy after then President George W. Bush admitted to violating a specific federal statute (FISA) and the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The President claimed his authorization was consistent with other federal statutes (AUMF) and other provisions of the Constitution, also stating that it was necessary to keep America safe from terrorism and could lead to the capture of notorious terrorists responsible for the September 11 attacks in 2001.
In 2008, Wired and other media reported a whistleblower disclosed a "Quantico Circuit", a 45-megabit/second DS-3 line linking a carrier's most sensitive network in an affidavit that was the basis for a lawsuit against Verizon Wireless. The circuit provides direct access to all content and all information concerning the origin and termination of telephone calls placed on the Verizon Wireless network as well as the actual content of calls, according to the filing.
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