EEV: Updated:2 AUG 2013 Current article proceeds : Still does not explain how the FBI does not know that quinoa is not a typical bomb making material.
In what might be Medium‘s first widespread Twitter moment, music writer Michele Catalano used the platform to blog details of an unexpected visit to her home yesterday, from six men she identifies as members of the “joint terrorism task force.”
Catalano asserts that the visit was likely prompted by her husband searching for the term “backpacks” in close conjunction with her searching for the term “pressure cookers” and her son reading the news. Or something.
Turns out the visit was prompted by the searches, but not in the way most speculation asserted – by a law enforcement-initiated, NSA-enabled dragnet of the couple’s web history. It turns out either Catalano or her husband were conducting these searches from a work computer. And that employer, “a Bay Shore based computer company,” called the police on their former employee.
The Suffolk County Police Department has just released the following information related to the case:
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
From what we can glean from LinkedIn, the computer company referenced above may be Speco Technologies, where Catalano’s husband Todd Pinnell worked as a product manager until last April (we’ve called Speco to confirm). This should be a teachable moment to anyone who thinks that their work computers are somehow not being tracked.
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.
But, an industry source confirms, it doesn’t work the other way around: i.e. Google isn’t flagging searches for “pressure cooker” + “backpacks” for the cops.
It’d be crazy if it did though.
Update: Catalano confirms this interpretation of the story. For those of you wondering where we got the press release: I called the Suffolk County Police Department for a statement, and they emailed it to me.
Original Article:
Woman believes feds searched her home because family googled backpacks and pressure cookers
- Michele Catalano, a writer for Forbes, published an account of the raid today
- She believes it was her families recent Google searches that prompted the visit
- The FBI, Nassau and Suffolk County Police Department have denied responsibility in the search
PUBLISHED: 16:57 EST, 1 August 2013 | UPDATED: 17:19 EST, 1 August 2013
Suspicious: Michele Catalano believes her family’s Google searches caused a ‘Joint Terrorism Task Force’ to visit her house
A Long Island woman believes her family’s recent Google searches caused a Wednesday morning visit by federal agents.
Michele Catalano, a writer for Forbes, published an account of what happened on Medium today, saying six plain-clothes cops showed up at her home, and proceeded to interview her husband about pressure cookers and search her house.
She believes her ‘news junkie’ son reading articles on the Boston Bombings, coupled with her hunt for a pressure cooker and her husband’s online shopping for a backpack created the ‘perfect storm of terrorism profiling.’
But so far the FBI, Nassau County and Suffolk County Police Departments have denied their part in the call.
While she wasn’t at home at the time, her husband was when three black SUVs drove up to their house and the cops exited and started to approach their property, flashing badges with handguns in their holsters.
Her husband went outside to meet the men and complied with their request to look around the house and backyard.
They walked around the living room, looked at books and pictures, and petted their dogs.
When they asked to go into the son’s room, her husband said he was sleeping and they left him alone.
They also interviewed him, asking about where he was from, where his wife was, and if they had any bombs. They also asked about whether they owned a pressure cooker.
Her husband said no, but that they had a rice cooker.
‘Can you make a bomb with that?’ they asked.
He told them his wife used it to make quinoa.
‘What the hell is quinoa?’ they asked.
What the hell is quinoa? After asking whether the family had a pressure cooker, Catalano’s husband said they only have a rice cooker to cook quinoa. The officers were mystified by the ancient grain
Catalano said that ‘by this point they realized they were not dealing with terrorists and the men wrapped their search up.
Her husband called her immediately after, laughing about the incident, but Catalano didn’t see the humor.
She said she felt a ‘great sense of anxiety’ when she realized that ‘this is where we are at.’
‘Where you have no expectation of privacy. Where trying to learn how to cook some lentils could possibly land you on a terrorism watch list,’ she wrote.
The FBI confirmed the visit to The Guardian, but said their officers weren’t involved.
A spokesman said it was Nassau County Police officers working in conjunction with the Suffolk County Police Department.
But a Nassau County police spokesman told MailOnline they weren’t involved.
‘We did not, did not, go out to this woman’s home,’ police spokesman James Imperiale said. ‘What agency went I couldn’t tell you. I don’t know.’
A Suffolk County Police spokesman referred media back to the FBI.
If the search were truly carried out due to suspicious Google searches, it would have required a warrant.
In a company report on transparency, Google detailed how they deal with law enforcement officials looking for evidence online.
‘The government needs legal process—such as a subpoena, court order or search warrant—to force Google to disclose user information. Exceptions can be made in certain emergency cases, though even then the government can’t force Google to disclose.’
Which has led some to question the validity of Ms Catalano’s story.
Today, she took to Twitter, writing that she wasn’t giving interviews to the media.
‘I’ll say it once: I didn’t make it up,’ she wrote. ‘Thanks to those defending my integrity.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2382791/Woman-believes-feds-searched-home-family-googled-backpacks-pressure-cookers.html#ixzz2amTvpWqN Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
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