I think the goal of this is to find out how exactly xxx gov agency is getting the information from these social networking sites. Obviously, if someone leaves their profile(s) publicly accessible, then the info is there for anyone to use, civilian or government personnel, for good or for ill. Now the real question is: what happens when someone wants info from a private profile? Are they creating fake profiles hoping to gain access? (masquerading as someone who knew you in high school, or any number of scenarios) Are they directly hacking/hijacking the accounts? Blatant invasions of privacy, both. Authorities should have to go through the same warrant procedure for something like this as they do with wiretaps, and I think to this point they've just been doing as they please.