A wiretap used to mean eavesdropping on an analog land line. The FBI has been playing catchup for the the past 20 years, and their wiretapping arsenal now includes SMS, push-to-talk and cell phones- all of it on demand and instant.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, using the Freedom of Information Act, obtained some information on the government’s communication surveillance system, dubbed DCSNet (Digital Collection System Network). While it’s just the tip of the iceberg- the FBI redacted much of the information in their submitted documents- it’s still interesting to see how the system operates.