Last update - 00:00 19/12/2007
A major invasion of privacy
By Haaretz Editorial
The justified fear of soaring crime has recently given birth to fantastic legislative proposals, like the Communications Data Law that the Knesset passed Monday night. Another bill, which is being pushed by Public Security Minister Avi Dichter, would allow the police to enter anyone's home in order to collect evidence, without the owner being present, without informing him in advance and without even informing him after the fact.
While the United States permits concealed entry only in terror cases, and the person whose house was searched must be told no more than one month afterward, the Israeli proposal includes no restrictions or limitations. It would not even bar concealed searches of the houses of lawyers, psychologists or journalists, whose professions require confidentiality.
Instead of equipping the police with resources that match the magnitude of their tasks, increasing the number of policemen and improving their level of professionalism - just as the Shin Bet security service, from which Dichter draws his ideas, did - the minister has chosen the easy but invasive solution. In reality, police will probably find it difficult to enter the houses of high-level criminals without their knowledge. But citizens suspected of minor crimes, or even those from whom the police hope to obtain information about other people, will be easy prey. The bill would not enable those whose houses are entered to insist on their rights, because they would not even know that their privacy had been invaded.
This astounding bill follows the Communications Data Law, which enables the authorities to obtain and even store information about any citizen's Internet, telephone and cell phone communications with excessive ease. While the U.S. Congress is debating the question of whether to allow law enforcement agencies to access telephones and personal computers, the Israeli Knesset passed this invasive and sensitive law with no trouble. Only at the last minute was an amendment adopted that would forbid data searches of professionals whose jobs require confidentiality. From now on, police will be able to obtain information from the telephone, cell phone and Internet companies with virtually no restrictions and with no connection to the severity of the crime under investigation.
Even today, the franchises awarded the cell phone and Internet companies include security annexes that enable the security services to access communications data in real time, while scrutiny of their actions takes place only after the fact, at periodic intervals. The restrictions on obtaining private information that the new law contains are minimal and do not sufficiently protect privacy. Should the new law be challenged in the High Court of Justice, the court might well rule it disproportionate, even though it serves an appropriate purpose.
The U.S. Congress, meanwhile, has been considering a bill similar to the Israeli law for almost a year, after the sweeping permits granted the authorities to track drug and terrorism suspects led to invasion of privacy lawsuits by private citizens against the telephone and cell phone companies.
The search for the easiest and most readily available tools in the war on crime attests to a lack of creativity among the investigative agencies and, even more, to a lack of professional staff and resources. If the police's computer department includes only six investigators, it is no wonder that they need Channel 10's investigative reporters in order to locate pedophiles over the Internet, and need draconian laws in order to fight crime.