Many of us are under surveillance, at this very moment. No warrants are needed, and no laws are broken.
The most obvious culprit is all the cameras, and America has as many surveillance cameras per person as Communist China. Police departments in America's largest cities, from New York to L.A., are combining these cameras with facial recognition technology to track everyone.
You're also giving away your personal information, about where you are, what you like, even about your mental health without even realizing it. Every click, purchase, and "like" is harvested and sold for profit by data brokers, feeding a growing digital advertising market that is close to one trillion dollars in value. Even your car tire sensors allow you to be tracked.
Byron Tau, author of the book Means of Control, says, "Those data brokers make that data available for sale to researchers, to marketers, to companies, and even to governments. So, it's very, very difficult to escape, the kind of logging and surveillance that modern technology brings along with it.
A Duke University study found that data brokers are also selling lists of people with depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder and PTSD, all harvested from medical apps and websites.
Constitutional Attorney John Whitehead says this is all a clear violation of the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches and seizures.
White says, "The Fourth Amendment's dead. Because on their phones and laptops, they have all this information on you. It's called 'predictive policing.' And they're watching everything people are doing."
The surveillance of Americans is an issue that should unite both the political Right and Left, because we're all losing an important constitutional protection.
Maass says, "If you care about something, then you should be worried about surveillance. I don't care what the issue is that you care about. It could be gun rights. It could be the rights of Palestinians. If you care about something, surveillance is going to harm your rights."
We asked the FBI if it is still buying the data of Americans. It did not respond.