THE NSA


VERIZON CUSTOMERS   PRISM   SURVEILLANCE TOPPLES CIA DIRECTOR   LAW THAT ALLOWS NSA TO READ EMAILS


NSA'S UNLIMITED, WARANTLESS DATA COLLECTION OF MILLIONS OF VERIZON CUSTOMERS

In 2013 the news was leaked in The Guardian by a whistleblower named Edward Snowden, that the National Security Agency has been routinely collecting the calls for millions of U.S. customers of Verizon, one of America's largest telecom providers. This order required Verizon on an "ongoing, daily basis" to give the NSA information on all telephone calls in its system. The secret foreign intelligence surveillance court (FISA) granted the order on April 25th, giving the government unlimited authority to obtain data until July 19th. The leaked document reveals that the call records for millions of U.S. citizens are being collected indiscriminately, in bulk - regardless of whether they were involved in any illegal activities or not. Under this order, the phone numbers for both parties are handed over as well as the call location, call duration, unique identifiers and the time the call was made - the contents of the conversation itself are not covered. This type of information is called "metadata," or transactional information rather than communication, so it technically does not require individual warrants to access. Yet metadata is still a highly invasive form of information collecting, since it gives the government the identity of every person with whom an individual communicates, how long they spoke, and their location at the time of conversation.

Julian Sanchez, a surveillance expert with the Cato Institute, is quoted explaining the following:

"We've certainly seen the government increasingly strain the bounds of 'relevance' to collect large numbers of records at once — everyone at one or two degrees of separation from a target — but vacuuming all metadata up indiscriminately would be an extraordinary repudiation of any pretense of constraint or particularized suspicion (The Guardian)."

The unlimited hand over of this metadata to the NSA is unusual. FISA court orders typically require the production of records pertaining to specific targets, who are being suspected of terrorist activity. Yet this current order is an all you can record buffet of American cellular activity. It is also not known whether Verizon is the only cell-phone provider being targeted with such an order; or if this three month order was a one time deal or merely the latest in a series of orders. Much of this information is highly classified. As controversial as this leak is, just imagine all the privacy invasion that we don't even know about.

The Guardian states the following:

"It is not known whether Verizon is the only cell-phone provider to be targeted with such an order, although previous reporting has suggested the NSA has collected cell records from all major mobile networks. It is also unclear from the leaked document whether the three-month order was a one-off, or the latest in a series of similar orders."

 

FORMER NSA WHISTLE BLOWER SAYS NOT TO GO TO COPS

Some say that Snowden should have complained to authorities rather than releasing this information to the public.Yet former whistleblowers, such as Thomas Drake, confirm that Snowden had only two realistic choices: do nothing or go public. Drake was a former spy for the NSA who went to the highest levels of command in his complaints about the NSA's attempts to gain unrestricted access to Americans' telephone and internet data. He believed that the Intelligence Whistleblower Protection Act would protect him, but today he now knows better. After taking his complaints to the highest levels of command at the NSA, he then went to Congress and the Department of Defense. By following protocol, Drake got flagged for raising serious issues. He was identified as a person not to be trusted. Also, none of the material evidence he released even made it into the official record (Truthdig).

 

DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE LIES TO SENATE COMMITTEE ABOUT NSA'S COLLECTION OF PHONE RECORDS

On March 12th, Ron Wyden who sits on the Senate Intelligence Committee asked DNI James Clapper if the NSA collects data on millions of Americans.

DNI James Clapper answers "No."

In light of the recent NSA leak, this testimony is obviously an outright lie.

This raises a serious question, what else is the NSA covering up?

James Clapper’s ‘least untruthful’ statement to the Senate (Washington Post, 6-12-13)

 

OFFICIAL ARTICLE TO LEAK NSA SURVEILLANCE

NSA collecting phone records of millions of Verizon customers daily (The Guardian, 6-5-13)

 

EDWARD SNOWDEN, NSA WHISTLE BLOWER

Why the Story on Snowden and the NSA Doesn't Add Up (Mother Jones, 7-1-13)

Edward Snowden, NSA file source(The Guardian, 6-8-13)

Edward Snowden: saving us from the United Stasi of America (The Guardian, 6-10-13)

Snowden Leak Highlights Few Whistleblower Protections for Intelligence Contract Employees (Truth-Out, 6-13-13)

Former NSA Whistle-Blower: Don’t Go to the Cops (Truthdig, 6-13-13)

 

OBAMA DEFENDS NSA SURVEILLANCE

Obama's Speech Defending NSA [Video and Speech Transcript] (The Wall Street Journal, 6-7-13)

NSA Official: Obama Was Informed of Spying on Merkel's Cell Phone, Let It Continue (The Dissenter, 10-27-13)

Obama's 'Independent' NSA Review Board Staffed With Administration Insiders (RT, 9-23-13)

Obama Administration Dishonestly Wants Public to Believe It Voluntarily Declassified Secret NSA Documents (Common Dreams, 9-11-13)

Obama Had Five Years to Host Debate on NSA, But Refused, says Former Senate Staffer (Common Dreams, 8-12-13)

Obama says the NSA has had plenty of oversight. Here’s why he’s wrong. (Washington Post, 6-7-13)

White House: Obama 'welcomes' surveillance debate (Politico, 6-5-13)

 

STATEMENTS FROM OTHER OFFICIALS

Congressional Oversight of the NSA is a Joke: I Should Know, I'm in Congress (The Guardian, 10-25-13)

Bernie Sanders On NSA Leak Revelations: We're Heading For An 'Orwellian Future' (Huffington Post, 6-11-13)

DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz: Snowden is a coward (Washington Post, 6-11-13)

Feinstein: "NSA Leaker Committed Treason" (The Hill, 6-10-13)

 

QUESTIONS ABOUT NSA'S EFFECTIVENESS WITH TERRORIST PLOTS

America as Economic Spy: NSA's Mission is Self-Aggrandizement, Not Fighting Terrorism (Huffington Post, 11-1-13)

NSA Disinformation: There's No Evidence that Massive Data Collection Thwarts Terror Attacks (Alternet, 10-23-13)

NSA surveillance played little role in foiling terror plots, experts say (The Guardian, 6-12-13)

 

RELATED LINKS

Could Google and the NSA Make Whistleblowers Disappear? (The Nation, 12-3-13)

Scared Silent: NSA Surveillance Has 'Chilling Effect' on American Writers (Common Dreams, 11-12-13)

NSA Surveillance Goes Beyond Orwell's Imagination (The Guardian, 9-23-13)

The NSA Unravels a Civil Rights-Era Win (Washington Post, 8-29-13)

To Repair the Damage Done in NSA Blow Up, Start With James Clapper (Alternet, 8-7-13)

Democratic Establishment Unmasked: Prime Defenders of NSA Bulk Spying (The Guardian, 7-25-13)

In Secret, Court Vastly Broadens Powers of NSA (New York Times, 7-6-13)

Revealed: NSA Does Not Need That Warrant After All (Common Dreams, 6-20-13)

NSA Programs Likely To Continue Despite Revelations (Huffington Post, 6-11-13)

Germany most-spied-on EU country by US - leaked NSA report (RT, 6-11-13)

This is, hands down, the scariest part of the NSA revelations (Foreign Passport, 6-10-13)

America's Most Anti-Democratic Institution: How the Imperial Presidency Threatens U.S. National Security (Alternet, 6-9-13)

How the US Congress Lost the Plot on Secrecy, Surveillance and Accountability (Common Dreams, 6-8-13)

The Bill of Rights Exists: An Open Letter to Dianne Feinstein (Common Dreams, 6-7-13)

All the Infrastructure a Tyrant Would Need, Courtesy of Bush and Obama (The Atlantic, 6-7-13)

10 Things Americans Underestimate About Our Massive Surveillance State (Alternet, 6-7-13)

NSA Spying: Whistle blowers Claim Vindication On Surveillance State Warnings (Huffington Post, 6-6-13)


VERIZON CUSTOMERS   PRISM   SURVEILLANCE TOPPLES CIA DIRECTOR   LAW THAT ALLOWS NSA TO READ EMAILS


PRISM'S UNLIMITED COLLECTION OF AUDIOS, VIDEOS, PHOTOS, EMAILS AND DOCUMENTS

Even greater government snooping powers were revealed in the Washington Post. Since 2007, the NSA and the FBI have had the power to watch many aspects of our online lives. Apparently the NSA and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies. The NSA is extracting audio, video, photographs, e-mails, documents and connection logs that enable analysts to track a person's movements and contacts over time. These nine companies are Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube and Apple.

This is part of a program code-named PRISM. This program is another measure that was put into place under the Bush Administration that has experienced rapid fire expansion under Obama (Alternet). In 2007, Congress passed the Protect America Act and the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which immunized private companies that cooperated voluntarily with U.S. intelligence collection. This act gave PRISM the freedom to recruit its first partner, Microsoft, and began a partnership of rapidly collecting data. When critics in Congress sought changes to the FISA Amendments Acts, the only lawmakers who knew about PRISM were bound by oath to keep silent. (Washington Post).

PRISM is also responsible for an alarming amount of government information:

"An internal presentation of 41 briefing slides on PRISM, dated April 2013 and intended for senior analysts in the NSA’s Signals Intelligence Directorate, described the new tool as the most prolific contributor to the President’s Daily Brief, which cited PRISM data in 1,477 items last year. According to the slides and other supporting materials obtained by The Post, 'NSA reporting increasingly relies on PRISM' as its leading source of raw material, accounting for nearly 1 in 7 intelligence reports.  (Washington Post)."

 

RELATED LINKS

Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly calls for PRISM shutdown (Washington Post, 6-11-13)

U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program (Washington Post, 6-7-13)

The PRISM Spin War Has Begun (Foreign Passport, 6-7-13)

Very Similar Statements from Facebook and Google on PRISM Still Have Holes (The Atlantic Wire, 6-7-13)

Obama’s Unparalleled Spy State (Alternet, 6-6-13)


VERIZON CUSTOMERS   PRISM   SURVEILLANCE TOPPLES CIA DIRECTOR   LAW THAT ALLOWS NSA TO READ EMAILS


SURVEILLANCE STATE TOPPLES CIA DIRECTOR

Not only are millions of every day Americans having their privacy invaded, but we must keep in mind that it was the same techniques of metadata searching that were ultimately responsible for taking down the CIA's Director, David Petraeus.

Metadata: Metadata was a powerful tool for the FBI in their investigation of David Petraeus. They used electronic metadata in their investigation that pinpointed specific times, places and IP addresses. TIME magazine gives a detailed timeline of the investigation that took place (TIME). The FBI was originally tracking metadata in reply to a complaint filed by a woman named Jill Kelly who had become the victim of cyberstalking. As FBI agents tracked the metadata, they found that the cyberstalking was being perpetrated by a woman named Paula Broadwell, who was General Petraeus's biographer. Further investigation of the metadata exposed an extra-marital affair between Petraeus and his biographer.

"Electronic metadata [pinpointed] the times and places and IP addresses associated with Kelley’s hidden correspondent identified Broadwell as the author. Investigators scooped up gigabytes of content from her other accounts—some under Broadwell’s name, others under aliases. As FBI agents sifted through the harassing e-mails, they found discussion of the movements and activities of high-level military officials—and of Petraeus. 'So that sparked the interest of the investigative agencies,' says a law-enforcement official. Some of the exchanges were sexually charged. By that point the implications extended far past a domestic dispute into the highest reaches of national security (TIME)."

Yet the scandal here is not just General Petraeus's sexual relations. While we are not condoning Petraeus's actions, we think that there needs to be more media scrutiny on the security apparatus that ultimately brought Petraeus down. This security apparatus is the government's ability to track the metadata for millions of people.

In his speech defending the NSA's surveillance techniques, Obama said that sifting through metadata would not violate people's personal lives:

"When it comes to telephone calls, nobody is listening to your telephone calls. That’s not what this program’s about. As was indicated, what the intelligence community is doing is looking at phone numbers and durations of calls. They are not looking at people’s names, and they’re not looking at content. But by sifting through this so-called metadata, they may identify potential leads with respect to folks who might engage in terrorism (The Wall Street Journal)."

Yet if metadata could reveal the CIA director's bedroom secrets, than what is it capable of revealing for millions of ordinary Americans?

 

RELATED LINKS

Timeline of Petraeus Investigation (TIME, 11-15-12)

Online Privacy Issue Is Also in Play in Petraeus Scandal (New York Times, 11-13-12)


VERIZON CUSTOMERS   PRISM   SURVEILLANCE TOPPLES CIA DIRECTOR   LAW THAT ALLOWS NSA TO READ EMAILS


THE LAW THAT LETS AUTHORITIES READ YOUR EMAILS

THIS COUNTS FOR OPENED EMAILS AND EMAILS THAT ARE 180 DAYS OLD

The NSA is legally allowed to read emails that are 180 days old without a search warrant as well as opened emails, this authority comes from a 1986 law that was established way before email communications became widespread. The section that allows the feds to read old emails is here. The exact text that allows this warrantless email access states the following:

A governmental entity may require the disclosure by a provider of electronic communications services of the contents of a wire or electronic communication that has been in electronic storage in an electronic communications system for more than one hundred and eighty days by the means available under subsection (b) of this section.

The FBI has recently provided the ACLU with documents further explaining this warrantless search of emails that are more than 180 days old. The standards come from the FBI's "Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide" (DIOG) from 2008 and 2012. The documents do not explicitly state whether FBI agents always get a warrant or not. However, there is language that suggests that a search without a warrant is possible, when the document is 180 days old.

On one hand, the 2012 FBI Guide states the following in section 18.6.8.2.3 (U) Retrieval:

"Contents held by those who provide "remote computing service" to the public and contents held in "electronic storage" for more than 180 days by an "electronic communication service" provider can be obtained with: a warrant; a subpoena with prior notice to the subscriber or customer; or an order issued by a court under 18 U.S,C, § 2703(d) when prior notice has been provided to the customer or subscriber (unless the court has authorized delayed notice). "

However, if the court has authorized "delayed notice," the following can happen:

"Title 18 U,S,C, § 2705 establishes the standard to delay notice for an initial period of up to 90 days, Records or other information pertaining to a subscriber to or customer of such services, including basic subscriber information, can be obtained with a search warrant or an 18 U.S,C, § 2703(d) order without notice."

Opened Emails do not have any privacy protections from federal search. According to the FBI's Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide, an opened email is no longer in "electronic storage" and therefore, customers may not retain a "reasonable expectation of privacy." (Arstechnica). We have included the provision that states this below:

18.7.1.3.4.3 (U) MAIL OPENINGS

(U) Mail in United States postal channels may be searched only pursuant to court order, or presidential authorization. United States Postal Service regulations governing such activities must be followed. A search of items that are being handled by individual couriers, or commercial courier companies, under circumstances in which there is a reasonable expectation of privacy, or have been sealed for deposit into postal channels, and that are discovered within properties or premises being searched, must be carried out according to unconsented FISA or FRCP Rule 41 physical search procedures.

18.7.1.3.4.4 (U) COMPELLED DISCLOSURE OF THE CONTENTS OF STORED WIRE OR ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS

(U) Contents in "electronic storage" (e.g., unopened e-mail and voice mail) require a search warrant. See 18 U.S.c. § 2703(a). A distinction is made between the contents of communications that are in electronic storage (e.g., unopened e-mail) for less than 180 days and those in "electronic storage" for longer than 180 days, or those that are no longer in "electronic storage" (e.g., opened e-mail). In enacting the ECPA, Congress concluded that customers may not retain a "reasonable expectation of privacy" in information sent to network providers. However, the contents of an e-mail message that is unopened should nonetheless be protected by Fourth Amendment standards, similar to the contents of a regularly mailed letter. On the other hand, if the contents of an unopened message are kept beyond six months or stored on behalf oft he customer after the e-mail has been received or opened, it should he treated the same as a business record in the hands of a third party, such as an accountant or attorney. In that case, the government may subpoena the records from the third party without running afoul of either the Fourth or Fifth Amendment. If a search warrant is used, it may be served on the provider without notice to the customer or subscriber.

 

A BILL TO END THE 180 DAY OLD, WARRANTLESS EMAIL SEARCHES

A bill has recently been introduced in the Senate by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Mike Lee (R-UT) that would require police to obtain a search warrant before scouring a subject's email accounts:

Senate Bill S.607

There is also a related House Bill:

H.R.1847

 

RELATED LINKS

No One is Talking About The Insane Law That Lets Authorities Read Any Email Over 180 Days Old (Business Insider, 6-7-13)

Eric Holder endorses warrants for e-mail. It’s about time. (Washington Post, 5-16-13)

FBI Believes It Can Conduct Warrantless Email Searches, New Documents Show (Huffington Post, 5-10-13)

FBI claims right to read your e-mail, just like other federal agencies (Arstechnica, 5-8-13)

FBI Documents Suggest Feds Read Emails Without a Warrant (ACLU, 5-8-13)

IRS tells agents it can snoop on emails without warrant, internal documents show (Fox News, 4-11-13)