Is the IRS Reading Your Emails Without a Warrant?
The ACLU sent an FOIA request to the IRS to determine if it has changed its policy (in effect as late as 2009) about reading emails. The IRS believed that a warrant wasn't necessary.
Based on the response to its request, and reading between the lines, the ACLU is not convinced the IRS has changed its position. [More...]
So does the IRS always get a warrant? Unfortunately, while the documents we have obtained do not answer this question point blank, they suggest otherwise. This question is too important for the IRS not to be completely forthright with the American public. The IRS should tell the public whether it always gets a warrant to access email and other private communications in the course of criminal investigations. And if the agency does not get a warrant, it should change its policy to always require one.
Here are the latest criminal investigation stats taken from the IRS website:
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