Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, November 26, 1993 TAG: 9311260093
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BONNIE V. WINSTON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
New FBI Director Louis Freeh told reporters in Richmond this week that the fiber optic technology transforming the communications industry may foil his agency's eavesdropping efforts, hampering critical investigations into everything from organized crime and drug-running to kidnapping and terrorism.
Unless something changes, "we'll be out of the wiretapping business in two to three years," Freeh lamented.
Fiber optics - the technology that is bringing the much ballyhooed "information superhighway" into homes - can carry up to 36,000 conversations on a single strand the thickness of human hair. Authorities say they have no way of sorting though those 36,000 conversations to listen in on just one.
"Right now, we can take a couple of alligator clips and we've got a conversation," said Major Wayne A. Garrett, deputy director of the Virginia State Police's Bureau of Criminal Investigation.
The copper wires now in wide use run in uniquely color-coded pairs from each phone customer's house and carry an analog signal. That means the conversation is transmitted in radio-like waves, and sounds much like it is spoken.
The state police, which conduct wiretaps for all local Virginia police departments after a court order is obtained, have the phone company identify the wires running from a "target's" house to a switching station. Then, using alligator clips and headphones, they generally can intercept the conversation anywhere in between.
A fiber-optic line carries thousands of conversations in pulsating beams of laser light, making it next to impossible to identify the conversation being sought, authorities said. And the digital signal it uses - which sounds much like the squawk of a fax machine or computer modem - can't be unscrambled with current wiretapping equipment.
Garrett said equipment to intercept digital calls is available, but much too costly for law enforcement agencies. The FBI even went to Congress last year, demanding legislation requiring telecommunications firms to guarantee law enforcement agencies access to its new information networks.
The proposal was withdrawn after an outcry by communications and computer companies. The firms opposed various provisions of the plan, including one requiring that phone companies' customers finance the modifications through rate increases that could cost billions of dollars.
"We're in the business to provide telecommunications to our customers at a reasonable cost. We're not in the business to provide wiretapping," said Paul T. Miller Jr., spokesman for C&P Telephone Co. of Virginia.
C&P, which handles telephone service for most of Virginia, has 300,000 miles of fiber optic lines, mainly linking high-volume telephone switching stations.
Miller said law enforcement authorities now intercept conversations by going somewhere closer to a person's house where old copper lines carry an analog signal.
But the company already is beginning to run fiber optic lines closer to customers' homes as it begins to offer more advanced services - such as video phones and interactive television - "that need more than just two copper lines," Miller said.
While he could not say when fiber lines will completely crisscross the state, Miller said Alexandria, where the process already has started, may have total fiber optic and digital service within two years.
Miller questioned why phone companies should foot the bill for law enforcement agencies to buy new intercept equipment.
"That is really a hidden tax," Miller said. "Equipment of that kind should be paid for by the government and not the phone company and its customers."
But Garrett said wiretapping, which courts are supposed to permit only as a last resort in serious felony cases, can make or break tough investigations.
"In some cases, this is the only way we can ultimately get a conviction," Garrett said. "If you take that tool away, we'll have nothing."
by CNB