Talk:National security letter

to do

Explain how a judge could have halted the program, and yet the FBI issued 9,000 NSLs last year. -- Geo Swan 01:08, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

What makes you think a judge halted the program? Read exactly what the article says. Tragic romance 13:13, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

This article needs to explain exactly how national security letters are compulsory, and how in practice recipients who refuse to comply are compelled to do so. -- Mikedelsol 12:12, 14 March 2007 (UTC) --tried to answer my own question using the March 2007 IG's report. --Mikedelsol 12:35, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Who made and amended these NSL 'laws' -- the Congress or the Executive? KyZan (talk) 00:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC)KyZan

Facially Unconsitutional

Does not mention fact that they are facially unconstitutional. --Daniel C. Boyer 19:28, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

An edit warrior refuses to even allow the fact that they were ruled unconstitutional to be put in the opening paragraph. 69.202.74.136 (talk) 06:10, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

To quote my response:

Source is citations 17, 18, 19, and 20 on the VERY SAME PAGE. It is not good encylopedia practice to repeat all four citations up top. I agree that "generally considered" was bad, opinion-prone. language. Hence the change to "was ruled unconstitutional". I don't see your justification for reverting that. 69.202.74.136 (talk) 06:14, 19 October 2008 (UTC) 69.202.74.136 (talk) 06:15, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I am changing the portion that says NSLs are unconstitutional: they were found unconstitutional at the district court level in Doe v. Gonzales but the point was declared moot in the second circuit court after the 2005 USA PATRIOT Improvement and Reauthorization Act. Obviously this wasn't trumpeted by the ACLU which seems to be the only source cited for this.Kilkeel (talk) 03:38, 13 April 2012 (UTC)Kilkeel

References

Rumors of Reddit being served a NSL

http://www.reddit.com/comments/6xdsx/reddit_got_served_an_nsl_fbi_has_all_your_records/

"I worked for Condé Nast as a _ until . I can reveal that sometime last year, reddit got a National Security Letter (NSL) from FBI, requesting access to the reddit logs. Much to my dismay, instead of enlisting ACLU help, the reddit admins promptly handed over all the data. I left reddit in disgust, but due to the gag order that comes with the NSL, I was not able to tell you what happened.

"I no longer can keep this a secret. So many of you may have become targets of FBI surveillance because of reddit admins' actions. If FBI identify my identity, I could be in serious legal trouble. But I still want all of you to know that instead of protecting your privacy, the reddit guys just handed your data over to the authorities."

Should add that it is not clear if this claim is true.

--James.

Requested move

FYI

 – User:JCScaliger has been indef blocked as a sockpuppet of User:Pmanderson (blocked for another year for abusive sockpuppetry).

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Moved to National security letter Mike Cline (talk) 12:51, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

---

National Security Letter → National security letter – Relisted. Vegaswikian (talk) 03:33, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Per WP:MOSCAPS ("Wikipedia avoids unnecessary capitalization") and WP:TITLE, this is a generic, common term, not a propriety or commercial term, so the article title should be downcased. In addition, WP:MOSCAPS says that a compound item should not be upper-cased just because it is abbreviated with caps. Lowercase will match the formatting of related article titles. Tony (talk) 13:25, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose This is the proper name of a specific type of document, regulated by a specific law. MOS says to capitalize proper names. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:30, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose as above. Usage is National Security Letter; a national security letter would be a clumsy phrase for a wide range of documents. JCScaliger (talk) 17:38, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

• Strong complaint – every time often when Tony or someone proposes fixing an over-capitalization error, Ernic and JC show up and claim it's a proper noun, without bothering to cite any evidence. How is this helpful? (I see Enric did support some of Tony's current downcasings; that's good; but the opposition without evidence is my complaint. The logic that specific types of things are called by proper nouns has no basis in English grammar nor in WP style, so counts for nothing.) Dicklyon (talk) 23:34, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

• and Support – per clear evidence in google books n-gram viewer, the term is far from being consistently capitalized in sources. You can click through to look at the usage and verify that most are in the sense of this article's topic. Dicklyon (talk) 23:34, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, what exactly is this proper noun definition that is being used as an excuse to upcase? I'd like a solid, practical decision before this is used. Tony (talk) 02:26, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

"a noun that designates an individual person, place, organization, animal, ship, etc., and is usually written with an initial capital letter"; as with (say) Australians, a proper noun can also denote any individual of a proper class, as here. JCScaliger (talk) 20:42, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

That's not even remotely analogous. You don't capitalize "homeless" for individuals in the class of homeless people; you capitalize Australian because it's root is a proper name. When you make up new compounds from generics, even if you make up acronyms for them, they're not proper nouns until an acceptance as shown by consistent capitalization in independent secondary sources says they are. Dicklyon (talk) 02:06, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Depends what the compound is used for; if it's used for an individual thing, like United Kingdom, it's a proper noun. So here. JCScaliger (talk) 02:49, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Because you say so? Or because sources consistently capitalize it? What about User:Greg L/Sewer cover in front of Greg L’s house? Why isn't that treated as a proper name? And are you saying that most of these books just made mistakes in not following your way? Dicklyon (talk) 03:33, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

If that were a name, instead of a nonce description (if somebody incorporated it, or set up a cult of sewer covers that included Sever Cover Two Blocks from White House and Sewer Cover in Front of Greg's House), it would be capitalized. JCScaliger (talk) 22:51, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

But that cult exists already; really, I'm a member; take my word for it, we always capitalize names of sewer covers; Greg got kicked out for not going along. Dicklyon (talk) 22:58, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Clicking through on the n-gram shows both that n-grams are unreliable on capitalization, and that many of the uncapitalized uses are adjectival (national security letter authority). JCScaliger (talk) 22:54, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Are you saying it's OK to downcase when usage a proper name as adjective? That's a novel concept. Did you also notice that on clicking through, many of the capitalized ones are titles, headings, and acronym-defining uses? At least you noticed that capitalization is not consistent, which was my point. Dicklyon (talk) 22:58, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

• Support. A proper noun requires that there be a single, unique entity; there is no the National Security Letter, but there are any number of national security letters. Just that there is a technical definition does not make it a proper noun, even though it is common practice in many technical communities to uppercase such nouns. Nageh (talk) 02:58, 31 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support, per Nageh. according to some of the logic expressed above, it would be no logical extreme to have 'fish and chips' or 'hot dog' capitalised. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 04:33, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
• Comment Without prejudice or passion to the motion, I am going to check the usage at The New York Times and the Washington Post. Both are most-reliable RSs run by professional editors with journalism degrees. I’ll also check the Associated Press, whose style is followed by some 99% of English-speaking newspapers in the world. So, here goes… Greg L (talk) 04:48, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
• Neutral with a feeling the usage is insufficiently lopsided one way or another to merit changing anything. I think the article properly uses the upper- and lowercase as it currently stands. Usage is mixed amongst the RSs depending on how precisely specific one is being. Sometimes, like “Patriot Act”, it is all-uppercase when treating the subject as *the particular type* of subpoena; especially in a more legalese style or if one thinks of it as “the act” or “the project.” Consistently in law, like this document by an attorney, or this document by the ACLU, it is all-caps. Other learned institutions like the American Library Association here, observe the legal practice with text like this: the unredacted National Security Letter (NSL) that the plaintiffs had challenged. However, one can refer to them in a more general sense or a given letter, like The Washington Post’s The number of people the FBI targeted with national security letters more than doubled last year to more than 14,000, or even when an individual national security letter is being discussed The New York Times’ (here) wrote Nicholas Merrill filed a constituional challenge over the national security letter the F.B.I. sent to a company he founded. The article currently seems to use the proper mix of upper- and lower-case usage. As for the title, it seems most encyclopedic to use the legalese form (all-cap). Greg L (talk) 05:16, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for checking, Greg. It looks like your findings are consistent with the usage I reported in books, and verify what I was saying: that capitalization is not necessary, as evidenced by lack of consistent capitalization in sources. Dicklyon (talk) 05:32, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose -- This is a proper name for a specific kind of document. If de-capitalised, it would merely be about any letter concerned with the national security of any country; and it is not. Peterkingiron (talk) 19:23, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

• Support. [Comments below this long contribution please, not within it.–N]

Once again we see exhibited a range of ill-founded opinions to support capitalisation against the clear, established style norms on Wikipedia. Let's examine some of the submissions above.

JCScaliger:

"Usage is National Security Letter; a national security letter would be a clumsy phrase for a wide range of documents."

A strange assertion, in view of the wording of the judgement in Doe v. Ashcroft (2004), cited as a key reference in the article (I underline for emphasis):

The FBI's demands under S 2709 are issued in the form of national security letters ("NSLs"), which constitute a unique form of administrative subpoena cloaked in secrecy and pertaining to national security issues. (p. 11)

Are we to think that a judgement handed down from the United States District Court uses a "clumsy phrase for a wide range of documents" in referring to "a unique form of administrative subpoena"? No, I suggest. JCScaliger, when challenged to say what a proper noun actually is (since he, Enric Naval, and a few others regularly make appeal to that concept), provided this answer:

" 'a noun that designates an individual person, place, organization, animal, ship, etc., and is usually written with an initial capital letter'; as with (say) Australians, a proper noun can also denote any individual of a proper class, as here."

He does not reveal it, but his words before "as with (say)" are from OED (entry for "proper", in current edition). I don't know where he gets this mysterious "proper class" from, but it is certainly not OED, and apparently not proper class as used on Wikipedia. The examples of proper nouns given in OED (including citations) include nothing resembling the present case, which is a phrase referring in a perfectly generic way to letters of a certain kind. And as usual, JCScaliger delivers nothing on the important distinction between proper noun and proper name. Finally, let us note that Dicklyon is right: despite being derived from the proper noun Australia, the noun Australian is certainly not a proper noun; nor is its plural, Australians. It is possible to convert Australian to a proper noun, as a nickname perhaps, just as any common noun or even any phrase at all can be so converted; tiger is converted when we nickname someone Tiger. But that is not relevant here.

"Depends what the compound is used for; if it's used for an individual thing, like United Kingdom, it's a proper noun. So here."

Again we see JCScaliger ignoring the distinction between noun and name. By the current best-reputed account (Huddleston and Pullum, Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, 2002), United Kingdom is a noun phrase and a proper name, but not a proper noun. (By the way, OED as strictly interpreted would not even allow it as a proper name; but that's for another discussion.)

Now:

"Clicking through on the n-gram shows both that n-grams are unreliable on capitalization, and that many of the uncapitalized uses are adjectival (national security letter authority)."

What? First, a major intent behind Google ngrams is to enable accurate diachronic reports that distinguish capitals. They do that more reliably than they manage diacritics (for which they are worse than useless) or punctuation. Second, what exactly does JCS find when he clicks through? He makes no palpable point if that is unexplained. Third, how can it be right or relevant if "national security letter", despite being allegedly a proper noun, gets lower-cased when used attributively (not "adjectivally", in the modern usage of Huddleston and Pullum) in modifying approach? Should it, really? I think few here would accept this sentence:

 ??"In the national security letter approach, a National Security Letter is issued under conditions of secrecy."

The discussion of sewer covers, cultic or quotidian, I pass over as clarifying nothing.

Peterkingiron:

"This is a proper name for a specific kind of document. If de-capitalised, it would merely be about any letter concerned with the national security of any country; and it is not."

Have I got this right? When General Motors speaks of its station wagons, it should capitalise the phrase every time, since this is about a specific kind of station wagon: a General Motors Station Wagon. And of course if it undergoes final testing, that is a particular GM kind of Final Testing:

?"Every one of our Station Wagons undergoes stringent Final Testing."

Do we think that's right? I don't! The United States District Court does not; Chicago Manual of Style does not; our relevant MOS page (WP:MOSCAPS) does not.

Only by making a quick uninformed assertion here at an RM (and in some cases repeatedly at many RMs) can the appearance of soundness for such spurious submissions be tentatively set up. But it is entirely illusory, and collapses before the first puff of real scrutiny. We need this to be clearer in policy somewhere: that people have to know what they're talking about at RMs, or at least listen to expert correction when it is offered.

Noetica^Tea? 03:44, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Noetica seems to be making a lot of sense here. Could we have some responses, please? Tony (talk) 05:11, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, of course he is right. The only alternative is to jettison MOS:CAPS and start capitalizing everything that JCScaliger asserts is proper. The sources are clear here: capitalization is just an optional styling that some elect to use, not necessary. Dicklyon (talk) 05:18, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

"Station Wagon" is a strawman. There are wagons that are not manufactured by GM. But there are no "national security letters" that are not from the FBI.

"Australian" is a derivative of the proper noun "Australia". The Chicago Manual of Style recognizes that "Proper nouns are usually capitalized, as are some of the terms derived from or associated with proper nouns." but "'For the latter, Chicago’s preference is for sparing use of capitals—what is sometimes referred to as a “down” style. [for example brussels sprout]" [1]. This is not Wikipedia's style, since we capitalize Brussels sprout. --Enric Naval (talk) 13:50, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

“Brussels sprouts”?? I wouldn’t have guessed. But I see an organic grower, Rodoni Farms, does so… though not consistently. I see an RM coming on that one. Not all wikipedians like caps and would like to see a consensus to have Wikipedia’s style guides set an example on how to change the English language for the better. We keep trying, like our three-year-long effort to change the world with hundreds of our articles reading like this: The Dell Peesocrap 9000 came with 256 mebibytes of RAM. Clearly, “mebibytes” has no ambiguity and is approved by the NIST and the people responsible for the metric system (the BIPM) and is just plain *better* than “megabyte”. The world didn’t follow our lead so we gave up on that one. Don’t give up, I say. Let’s use Wikipedia as a platform to Make English More Logical and Pretty Without Unsightly Caps. (I’m feeling irreverent this morning) Greg L (talk) 17:46, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Enric Naval:

I used the "Station Wagon" example against Peterkingiron's argument: "This is a proper name for a specific kind of document. If de-capitalised, it would merely be about any letter concerned with the national security of any country; and it is not." Against what he says, "Station Wagon" is not a straw man. But if, as you say, national security letters are only of one kind and from one source, so that no question of scope arises, then Peterkingiron's argument gets no traction at all. No distinction needs to be marked, by capitalisation or otherwise.

You then write: " 'Australian' is a derivative of the proper noun 'Australia'," and you point out CMOS's analysis and preferences for such derivatives. I don't know why you do that; but let us note that it counters nothing that I wrote and nothing in Wikipedia's style guidelines.

Greg:

You write: "Not all wikipedians like caps and would like to see a consensus to have Wikipedia’s style guides set an example on how to change the English language for the better." But that's not what is happening. The relevant WP style guidelines (mainly at wp:mos and wp:moscaps) are not militant or revisionist. The major style guide CMOS has an avowed policy of keeping capitalisation to a minimum, reflecting the dominant modern preference in serious publishing. WP:MOSCAPS follows that trend also: "Wikipedia avoids unnecessary capitalization."

Clearly in the present case, if sources including the United States District Court do not capitalise "national security letter", we cannot think that it is "necessary" to capitalise it. That's all, yes? That, along with the elementary dismissal of the phrase as a "proper noun", settles the case neatly. As usual with matters of style, usage is diverse; so we cannot simply appeal to reliable sources. That is why there are style guides, manuals of style, and dictionaries; and that is how and why MOS has its vital role in Wikipedia.

Noetica^Tea? 22:31, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I invite the closing admin to look at this page and see what's happening. JCScaliger (talk) 22:31, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

lawsuits are outdated

Doe v. Gonzales and Doe_v._Ashcroft are outdated. They don't contain the results of the appeals. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:52, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Probably

Hi Accuracy11. I'm writing about this edit, in which you added unsourced commentary in two different places:

• "The New York Times reported the Pentagon and the CIA have issued NSLs, although that information was probably misreported because the federal statutes do not authorize the CIA to issue NSLs."
• "(Merrill probably meant to say that he could have told his girlfriend he was meeting with his attorney, but that he could not reveal to her what the meeting was about.)"

You clearly know a lot about NSLs, and your contributions to this page are valued, but these particular additions seem like unverifiable original research to me. Per our verifiability policy, we're limited to presenting what reliable sources such as the New York Times and the Washington Post say. It's not our place to speculate that the sources were "probably" misreported the truth or the interviewees were "probably" misunderstood. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 07:18, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Accuracy11, you continue to edit on the assumption that the NY Times source is wrong when it says the CIA and Pentagon have issued NSLs. The fact that in your analysis NSLs issued by agencies other than the FBI is illegal does not mean it doesn't happen. The source addresses this issue in its fifth paragraph, where it explains that Congress has not authorized the CIA or the Pentagon to issue NSLs. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 08:33, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Gag order

Accuracy11, can you please explain here why you want to use "nondisclosure order" instead of "gag order?" Most reliable sources use "gag order." Generally speaking we usually follow reliable sources and avoid legal jargon. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 08:49, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

I already answered those two questions. When a source is demonstrably incorrect, it is apparently not a "reliable" source for that matter at issue. A "gag order" IS legal jargon. And it is used in a criminal cases. There are no "gag orders" in NSL cases because they are not criminal cases. The public court docket in the case even memorializes no "gag orders" issued in the case. Finally, based on the reputable source rule you cite, if the New York Times called it a "Cheese Head" instead of what it’s really called (read the statute), what courts call them (read the order) then we would edit the Wiki entry by substituting "Cheese Head" for "gag order." I propose we be more accurate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Accuracy11 (talk • contribs) 01:34, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Comey said internet browsing history may be requested by a NSL

During testimony in an oversight hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 3, 2017, FBI Director James Comey said that internet browsing history may be requested by a NSL. I added this to the article and cited the source, but it was removed saying "not a reliable source". @DrFleischman: Are you saying that the Congressional Record is not a reliable source for what someone says during a congressional hearing? Sparkie82 (t•c) 00:22, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

The problem is that at least the way you phrased it, you were using Comey's testimony as a source for the contention that internet browsing history may be requested by a NSL. It can't be used that way. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 04:34, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

How about adding the sentence, "The FBI director has claimed that NSLs may request internet browsing history."? Sparkie82 (t•c) 11:37, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

Not in the lead section, and not as written. Comey's statement (which isn't reliable, btw) is part of the broader question of whether, how, and when the FBI was authorized to request internet browsing history in an NSL. For instance, here's a reliable source from June 2016 saying the FBI was not authorized. Here's a reliable source from the same period saying the Obama administration requested authorization and there was pending legislation. There are likely more reliable sources on this subject. Put those together, and I can potentially see Comey's May 3, 2017 statement fitting in. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 16:53, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

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Vandalized Page Preview

I assume that these are the leftovers of a vandalism attack by 105.74.13.220, but the preview still has some gibberish that I don't know how to get rid of.

I suggest that once this is handled, this page should have some sort of protection, given its history. Ceruleanix (talk) 21:24, 7 December 2023 (UTC)