Civil rights groups seek end to collection of government reports on 'suspicious activity'

Surveillance: Civil rights groups seek end to collection of government reports on 'suspicious activity' by Americans

By Thomas Peele and Josh Richman

Staff writers
Posted: 09/19/2013 06:47:05 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO -- Be careful if you're heading out to buy a lot of bottled water or photograph a California landmark. The government is watching, and it may put details about what you're doing into a giant antiterrorism database, especially if you appear to be Arab or Muslim.

More than 1,800 "suspicious activity reports" collected by law enforcement officers and shared with federal agencies through clearinghouses called "fusion centers" that were released Thursday showed for the first time in California that activities like photographing buildings, flying the U.S. flag upside down, or even just giving the cold shoulder to a neighbor may result in the firm rap of FBI agents on your door and demands that you explain yourself.

This is especially true for Arabs, Muslims and people of South Asian descent, who are more often the subject of the secret reports, the value of which are dubious and have never been shown to have resulted in a terrorism-related arrest, members of civil rights groups said Thursday.

The government "should not be putting us in databases as potential terrorists when we have nothing to hide and haven't done anything wrong," said Linda Lye, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California. "This is wrong and it needs to stop."

full: http://www.mercurynews.com/politics-government/ci_24135780/civil-rights-groups-call-an-end-collection-government