US judge protects way FBI spies on computers

12.00 pm

NEWARK, New Jersey - The details of an FBI computer snooping system used to spy on an alleged mobster will remain under wraps as classified information by order of a federal judge, according to court papers obtained today.

Prosecutors have instead filed in US District Court in Newark an "unclassified summary" of the so-called keylogger system, which broadly describes the system's decoding ability.

Acting under a search warrant in May 1999, agents broke into the computer files of Nicodemo Scarfo, accused of running gambling and loan-sharking operations in New Jersey.

They installed a "keylogger device" that recorded his every keystroke, including a pass phrase that decoded an encryption system that Scarfo, the son of imprisoned mobster Nicodemo "Little Nicky" Scarfo, had installed to scramble the records.

Scarfo's attorneys moved for suppression of information gathered by the keylogger, contending that the surveillance might have violated federal wiretap laws and the Fourth Amendment right to protection from illegal search and seizure.

The government countered that the system was protected, classified material whose disclosure would threaten criminal and national security operations and put FBI agents in danger, according to court papers.

Last week, US District Court Judge Nicholas Politan ruled that prosecutors had proved the material should remain secret.

Scarfo's attorney, Vincent Scoca, said he will challenge the summary as "insufficient to fully litigate the issue."

In light of the Sept 11 attacks on the United States, Scoca conceded that "now is not the best time to be arguing against national security," but he added that civil liberties still needed protection.

"We all want to be secure. But when this crisis is over, we want to make sure our civil liberties are intact," he said.

The case is believed to be the first in the United States in which federal agents installed a secret surveillance system in a personal computer under a search warrant and the first to be tested in US courts.

- REUTERS