Did Ferguson Police Use "Kill Switch" on Livestream Signal The Moment They Created Chaos?

"It keep saying 'no network error'. We had a foreign reporter on the roof with us and she wasn't able to get a signal on her cell phone. And people on the ground were saying 'I can't tweet out.'" -Livestreamer Argus Radio.

Eric Blair

It seems like the police state is using protests in Ferguson as a testing ground for all of their crowd-control weapons. Many are obvious like the curfew enforced by platoons of soldiers, armored tanks mounted by snipers, stun, tear and smoke grenades, no-fly zone, sound cannons, and designated free speech zones and media zones (apparently they're different now). 

However, some weapons are less obvious like technology to kill livestream feeds during questionable police activity. And that's precisely what happened last night according to Ferguson's most prolific livestreamer Argus Radio.

The GIF above, taken from the final seconds of Argus Radio feed from last night, shows the moment the police bum rush the crowd and create mass panic in an attempt to catch someone. Moments later the livestream feed was cut and registered a network error, according to Argus Radio.

Back from the Dead: The Internet “Kill Switch”

The American author William Faulkner once wrote: “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” 

Tom Burghardt  
Dissident Voice

And like a horde of flesh-eating zombies shuffling out of a parking garage to feast on what’s left of our freedoms, the Obama administration has promised to revive a proposal thought dead by most: the internet “kill switch.”

On May 12, the White House released a 52-page document outlining administration plans governing cybersecurity. The bill designates the Department of Homeland Security as the “lead agency” with authority to initiate “countermeasures” to protect critical infrastructure from malicious attacks.
But as with other aspects of U.S. policy, from waging aggressive wars to conducting covert actions overseas, elite policy planners at the Pentagon and at nominally civilian agencies like DHS hide offensive plans and operations beneath layers of defensive rhetoric meant to hoodwink the public.

The term “countermeasure” is described by the White House as “automated actions with defensive intent to modify or block data packets associated with electronic or wire communications, internet traffic, program code, or other system traffic transiting to or from or stored on an information system for the purpose of protecting the information system from cybersecurity threats, conducted on an information system or information systems owned or operated by or on behalf of the party to be protected or operated by a private entity acting as a provider of electronic communication services, remote computing services, or cybersecurity services to the party to be protected.” (Section 1. Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity Authority, May 12, 2011, p. 1)

In other words, the proposal would authorize DHS and presumably other federal partners like the National Security Agency, wide latitude to monitor, “modify or block” data packets (information and/or communications) deemed a threat to national security.

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Feds Want to Make It Easier to Eavesdrop Online

BILL SEEKS TO EXPAND GOVERNMENT'S WIRETAPPING POWER

By Emily Rauhala,  Newser Staff

The feds say online wiretaps will keep us safe.   (Shutterstock)

(NEWSER) – The feds want to overhaul wiretappingregulations to expand their ability to eavesdrop online, reports the New York Times. The Obama administration plans to submit a bill to Congress next year that would require all service providers to be technically capable of wiretapping the communications they enable, from encrypted BlackBerry emails to Skype messaging. Law enforcement types say their surveillance capabilities are "going dark" as everybody—from mob bosses to drug cartels—turns away from telephones. 

Officials point to the case of the failed Times Square bomber, who was discovered to have communicated online via a service that didn't have the ability to intercept his messaging; even if investigators had caught wind of Faisal Shahzad's plans before the attempt, their ability to wiretap him would have been delayed. Of course, not everybody agrees. Listening in online threatens the “Internet revolution,” says a rep from the Center for Democracy and Technology. “They basically want to turn back the clock and make Internet services function the way that the telephone system used to function.” And, says one prof, forcing firms to find ways to "unscramble" encrypted messages could backfire. “I think it’s a disaster waiting to happen,” he says. “If they start building in all these back doors, they will be exploited.” 

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