This year, privacy is a key issue for Congress. Carnivore has the ability to intercept and access e-mail and other electronic communications. Through a box the FBI installs on the network operation centers of Internet service providers, Carnivore can chew through any message in the ISP's network, but the FBI claims to look only at messages sent or received from criminal suspects after obtaining a warrant. Past government abuses of data have led activists and politicians to call for an examination of Carnivore's abilities. The FOIA requests revealed that the government had been scanning e-mail and tracing people's Web browsing habits.
History demonstrates continual privacy violations by government for political gain.
It's hard to forget the intrusive campaigns of J. Edgar Hoover's FBI, and how law enforcement abused its authority by wiretapping Martin Luther King and Vietnam war protesters. This is why Americans should demand a complete disclosure of the Carnivore program. If citizens cannot stop the government's affinity toward unsavory spy behavior, at least they can attempt to protect themselves with competing technologies. In this spirit, the Carnivore source code should be made public. Making matters worse, the FBI appears to have problems protecting its own data.