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NSA Surveillance Heat Map: NSA Lied To Congress
anagama writes "NSA officials have repeatedly denied under oath to Congress that even producing an estimate of the number of Americans caught up in its surveillance is impossible. Leaked screenshots of an NSA application that does exactly that, prove that the NSA flat out lied (surprise). Glenn Greenwald continues his relentless attacks with another bombshell this time exposing Boundless Informant. Interestingly, the NSA spies more on America than China according to the heat map. Representative Wyden had sought amendments to FISA reauthorization bill that would have required the NSA to provide information like this (hence the NSA's lies), but Obama and Feinstein demanded a pure reauthorization of FISA, which they got at the end of 2012." And if you don't mind that you might have your name on yet another special list, you might enjoy this Twitter-based take on the ongoing news.
Absolutely nothing to nobody.
The United States of Apathy.
This is impossible and I am willing to believe everything the NSA said.
And if you do not believe the same you are very unpatriotic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Veag-ptUkXI
It's too late to stop this or even do anything about it. The only actions that can be taken would be to physically destroy the facilities that handle this data gathering and store the harvest.
It's clear that the US government doesn't care about our laws of Constitution. They lie to the people, to Congress, to judges and even to each other. This crap started late in the GWB's second term and our current administration of "change" has done nothing about it except to expand its reach.
The PUTUS lied to the congress
The congress lied to the people ... and the people ... becomes sheeple
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
I hope you americans now realize what you let happen.
Inaction is no worse than active support.
Interestingly, the NSA spies more on America than China according to the heat map
I thought my eyes had fooled me, and I ended up re-read that sentence 5 times ...
What the fuck is going on ?
Did we elect the WRONG president ?
The Lives of Others
There's a big difference,though.
Aside being complete fiction, the monitor was directly listening in, empathized with the folks he was spying on, was disillusioned with his cause and leadership and basically burned out with the whole job - IIRC.
With the NSA, they have mostly automated systems that are listening in on everyone in a mechanical way that doesn't allow for empathy and identification with the vict...subject, you have monitors that believe that they are "protecting" the US from its enemies (drank the Red, White and Blue Kool-Aids),and add in bureaucrats who have to cover their asses in order to keep their over paid cushy jobs (please, getting chewed out by a grandstanding toothless namby pamby Congress that would NEVER think of really doing anything for fear of being labeled"Soft on Terror" by the morons on Fox News and the idiots who watch it? Entertainment for the grillee! ).
The other thing is, where's the Jewish community? Why aren't they up in arms over this? Doesn't this feel like Nazi/East Germany?
Never forget indeed.
If we're going to go the way of China, could we at least have some of our manufacturing jobs back?
Are you kidding? Do you have any idea how difficult it was to come up with "scathing" questions that could be lied to with the technical truth? I seriously doubt any but the most naive in Congress are at all surprised by these events, but obviously they have to *act* surprised on camera or there might be public outcry that could damage their own boat. Meanwhile they also need to give the folks being questioned plenty of wiggle room as a professional courtesy, after all any one of them could be the next victims of some inquest or other. Plus you know, NSA. They almost certainly have career-ending dirt on every major politician in the country, you gotta be sure that in the back-room after-meeting you can make a good claim that you did everything you could to protect them or your own face may feature in the next front-page scandal.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
You're reading the heatmaps wrong. It doesn't indicate what each country has collected on itself. It indicates what the NSA has collected on each country.
Contact your Representatives and DEMAND that the PATRIOT act be repealed. It is wrong that it ever became permanent and was supposed to only be a temp measure.. IT is being abused and is an abomination to everything that america holds dear.
Write a LETTER and an email you your representatives now and demand they repeal it. Without the PATRIOT act, Everything crumbles at their feet.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Wrong question anyway...
What is it with the apparent belief that the US Constitution is only supposed to guarantee rights for US citizens?
This seems to be an implicit assumption in the public reaction to the NSA spying scandals. The Constitution makes no such distinction; it is intended to limit the power of the government, period, regardless of who is affected. If this were not the case, the US government could do anything it wanted to foreigners: search without a warrant, detain them indefinitely without charges, torture them, even murder them.
Oh, right...
Sorry for the cynicism, but the point should be obvious: This is clearly not the intent of the Constitution. The US government is out of control, but too many Americans excuse this by saying "well, it's mostly them foreigners, so it's ok". It is not ok. Anyway, it is now beyond obvious that the US government routinely violates the rights of everyone including US citizens.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
Wait-- "NSA officials have repeatedly denied under oath to Congress that even producing an estimate... is impossible. "
They denied that it's impossible? So, it's possible.
This may be the worst-written summary ever, since it says exactly the opposite of what the headline says. Could slashdot find some people who understand double negatives?
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
"She [NSA spokesperson] added: "The continued publication of these allegations about highly classified issues, and other information taken out of context, makes it impossible to conduct a reasonable discussion on the merits of these programs.""
Oh. Oh really? Well, that's really a shame, given that you should have conducted a reasonable discussion on the merits of these programs BEFORE implementing them!
People might even be okay with these programs depending upon the nature of what's being done and the rationale for it. People already accept things such as the need for police to conduct wiretaps if the case is good enough for a judge to issue a warrant. But we're in a democracy. If you don't even talk to the people about this kind of widespread sweep, and get feedback on whether it is acceptable to them or not, then of course they're fricking angry when they find out how far you've gone without consulting them. This thing has long been suspected by plenty of people. It's not a big surprise. But why the hell are you surprised that it's a freaking mess to try to sort things out after the fact becomes official? I mean, I know the "act first, ask for forgiveness later" approach might be deeply engrained in the intelligence community, but you're talking about wholesale monitoring of people's communications. Of course there is going to to a be a lot of misinformation and confusion when you don't provide any information yourself about it. Deal with it. Properly. Please. Correct the inaccuracies.
This is one of those situations where if you don't get out in front of the thing with some factual and specific information promptly, then nobody is going to believe you even if you do tell the truth.
How can public relations people working for an intelligence agency be so clued out about how to handle this? Oh, there's misinformation? No kidding? And you think not saying how the program actually works will cure the problem? Bizarre.
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
Citizenship is not mentioned and the clear intent of the Amendment is to limit the kinds of things the government can do. In a reasonably broad interpretation, it means that whoever the person is, regardless of citizenship, a warrant is required. In a reasonably narrow interpretation, "the people" means everybody who lives or does business in the United States. Remember that at the time this was written, the notion of citizenship was not sharply defined. There were many people living under the jurisdiction of US law whose status wasn't entirely clear. What people cared about was what the government had power to do in the States.
From a previous post, here's the collected list of suggested actions
people can take to help fix the government.
Have more ideas? Please post below.
Links worthy of attention:
http://anticorruptionact.org/
http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_the_republic_we_must_reclaim.html
http://action.fairelectionsnow.org/fairelections
http://represent.us/
http://www.protectourdemocracy.com/
http://www.wolf-pac.com/
https://www.unpac.org/
http://www.thirty-thousand.org/
Suggestion #1:
(My idea): If people could band together and agree to vote out the
incumbent (senator, representative, president) whenever one of these
incidents crop up, there would be incentive for politicians to better
serve the people in order to continue in office. This would mean
giving up party loyalty and the idea of "lessor of two evils", which a
lot of people won't do. Some congressional elections are quite close,
so 2,000 or so petitioners might be enough to swing a future election.
Someone added: Vote them out AND remove their lifetime,
taxpayer-funded, free health care. See how fast the health care system
gets fixed.
Someone added:You can start by letting your house and senate rep know
how you feel about this issue / patriot act and encourage others you
know to do the same.
If enough people let their representivies know how they feel obviously
those officials who want to be reelected will tend to take notice. We have
seen what happens when wikipedia and google go "dark", congressional
switchboards melt and the 180's start to pile up.
I added: Fax is considered the best way to contact a congressperson,
especially if it is on corporate letterhead.
Suggestion #2:
Tor, I2dP and the likes. Let's build a new common internet over the
internet. Full strong anonymity and integrity. Transform what an
eavesdropper would see in a huge cypherpunk clusterfuck.
Taking back what's ours through technology and educated practices.
Let's go back to the 90' where the internet was a place for
knowledgeable and cooperative people.
Someone Added: Let's go full scale by deploying small wireless routers
across the globe creating a real mesh network as internet was designed
to be!
Suggestion #3:
A first step might be understanding the extent towards which the
government actually disagrees with the people. Are we talking about a
situation where the government is enacting unpopular policies that
people oppose? Or are we talking about a situation where people
support the policies? Because the solutions to those two situations
are very different.
In many cases involving "national security", I think the situation is
closer to the second one. "Tough on X" policies are quite popular, and
politicians often pander to people by enacting them. The USA Patriot
Act, for example, was hugely popular when it was passed. And in
general, politicians get voted out of office more often for being not
"tough" on crime and terrorism and whatever else, than for being too
over-the-top in pursuing those policies.
Suggestion #4:
What I feel is needed is a true 3rd party, not 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th
parties, such as Green, Tea Party, Libertarian; we need an agreeable
third party that can compete against the two majors without a lot of
interference from small parties. We need a consensus third party.
Suggestion #5:
Replace the voting system. Plurality voting will
Urm, we're supposed to live in a democracy, right?
If there are real threats, (and seems to be plenty of them), that this technology can efficiently and effectively combat, then explain it to the people who vote and also pay for the damn thing.
Don't give me BS about how that will somehow "compromise" the security of the system; specific facts (like the names of agents) compromise security, not generic information about what information you are gathering, on whom.
These people lie to avoid oversight, is all. That way leads to tyranny.
If they cannot explain why this is in our interests, then it's not.
"I have a hard time believing the US performs more domestic surveillance than Putin's Russia."
Why? This is America! We're number 1! Fuck, yeah!
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Quantitative Easing: all the government bond which don't sell on the free market are bought by the Federal Reserve. This isn't a side effect of the QE. It is QE. As long as the Federal Reserve keeps buying excess debt, the interest rate is artificially low. This "debt" is then repaid with issuing more bonds and selling them to the FED through QE. This wouldn't be money printing if there was an interest on the debt. It would be a pyramid scheme, but not printing. BUT! Any interest paid to the FED is deposited in the Treasury as "profit". So FED buys Treasury bonds, Treasury repaid this debt with interest. Treasury gets back the interest from the FED as "FED's profit from interest on lending". End effect? Treasury borrows from the FED at 0%. What is called when you borrow money at 0%, never pay the principal and only pay the interest? It's not money printing? What is it, then?
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
They don't _have_ to read / listen to your communication -- it's kind of like a spam filter, the PRISM software assigns a score to the particular piece of information based on the number of keywords that occur in it (a 'blind' answer presumably provided by an API provided by the various 'partners'), where it came from, who you are, etc.
If the score is high enough, they get a warrant and _then_ they read / listen to your communication (assuming you're a Yank, otherwise they just request it.) The problem is that one imagines false-positives to be rather abundant -- and the NSA doesn't just 'forget' if your communication turns out to be of no concern. Indeed, you're liable to discover that, although they were wrong, the fact they got a warrant with your name on it / requested it at all will add additional weight to the scores assigned your future communications, leading to additional warrants / requests.
There's no magic genie here that whispers to the NSA, "hey, look at this!" It's still largely guesswork, and those guesses are likely often wrong. But hey, if you want to stay in the "for the greater good / won't happen to me" camp, then enjoy -- but don't be silly enough to think the system has anything resembling accuracy, and that all those it flags deserve the scrutiny.
This means YOU, United States techie boyz & girlz. This thing is playing out just as I sketched it out here on Slashdot a couple days ago.
NSA is orchestrating a limited hangout to try and focus and tie off the entire surveillance issue into a neat little package of FISA and a 'manageable' number of transactional transgressions. Not surprisingly the New York Times gobbled up the bait, fronting the idea that this whole rasmatazz is about a few digital drop boxes where companies dropped users' data upon being served with warrants.
"Look marge, the Times says there were only 1,856 FISA warrants served last year. Probably for baad people. What's all the fuss about?"
Straw man going DOWN.
NSA needs to be summoned to Congress to disclose the nature and extent of their domestic communications backbone piggyback-slurp operation: its collection points, its storage capabilities and the number of personnel who are aware of and have access to this raw data source. And whether SOME of those personnel are foreign nationals recruited for the task to reduce their exposure and liability. (Greetz Israel.)
NSA needs to be summoned to Congress to disclose any SSL private key sharing agreements, an intimidation tactic that goes like this, "We're either going to move in here with secret directives, equipment and gag orders ... OR you will share all your private keys on a regular basis," which gives them access even to emails that never left their networks, they can read it as you drop it off and pick it up.
Nothing less will work.
EFF is fighting a jurisdictional war right now. FISA has told them they must take their case to local district and federal court. Those courts have said they must take it to FISA. It is an impasse. This is a bas Constitutional Supreme Court issue and the only way to get there is through the circuit. Enough Congress must be raised to estabish through legislation or resolution that this issue is an existential threat to the republic and the courts are authorized to hear it because this surveillance is occurring within the borders and citizens are being targeted.
Only Congress has the power to do this. No amount of picketing or marching or whining will win this one.
Or just let it go and knock that PRISM limited hangout straw man down, declare the problem solved and let the terrorists win. Fall of the republic.
Ball's in our court.
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
It's call dumping. An administration "leaks" all the stories they don't want to come out during an election cycle. By the time the next election comes around, nobody cares and it all seems like old news.
I knew it, A Conspiracy!!! I'll bet the NSA is behind it.
Democratic senator Ron Wyden: "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?"
NSA Director James Clapper: "No sir, not Intentionally."
How do you reconcile Mr. Clapper's response with the Verizon court order?
"It is hereby ordered that [Verizon Business Network Services'] Custodian of Records shall produce to the National Security Agency all call detail records or ‘telephony metadata’ created by Verizon for communications (i) between the United States and abroad; or (ii) wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls,"
Mr. Clapper LIED. There's no way around it.
Hear, hear!
As a native born citizen, I get a little tired of the notion so popular these days that only citizens are entitled to Constitutional protections. Unless you're here with a diplomatic status, everyone in the US is subject to its laws while here. I don't think anyone disagrees with that. Guess what? Our most important laws are called the Constitution, which includes the Bill of Rights.
And when they ask better questions, I suppose you're going to say that it depends on what the definition of 'is' is.
That's exactly his point. In law, as in any other profession, different words mean different things. To a computer professional, "it" means "information technology." To a judge, LEO means "law enforcement officer" while to someone from NASA it means "low Earth orbit."
Lawyers know the legal meanings of words, which may not be exactly the same as what your Websters says.
Free Martian Whores!
It's worse then that. The bonds the fed just bought are 'hard assets'. Through the magic of fraction reserve banking the Fed loans out about 10x that amount, getting about inflation from their customers.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
I've found the video, watch James Clapper act. Senator Ron Wyden, *ALREADY KNOWS* they are spying on everyone in America, he's a Senator whose been briefed. So Wyden knows Clapper is fucking lying to him/America.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2013/jun/07/privacy-wyden-clapper-nsa-video
You thought you had a democracy, you thought things were agreed, set in law, and yet we find out, you were kept out of the loop. A country run by an elite. Mushrooms fed on shit and kept in the dark.
I did some research, and these are the facts.
In 2012, of the 1,789 requests made by the government to monitor electronic communications, one was withdrawn by the government. Of the remaining 1,788 applications which came up before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), not a single one was denied. Yes, all 1,788 applications to monitor electronic communications were approved.
In case you question the source, we know this from a 30 April 2013 letter from the Department of Justice to Senator Harry Reid. The source article is here.
With a track record of 1,788 out of 1,788, thats an amazing homerun for the DoJ. Im forced to conclude that you are right, it is a fig leaf and a mighty flimsy one at that.
Incidentally, Reggie Walton, presiding judge of the FISC has denied being a rubber stamp court. In his own words :-
"There is a rigorous review process of applications submitted by the executive branch, spearheaded initially by five judicial branch lawyers who are national security experts and then by the judges, to ensure that the court's authorizations comport with what the applicable statutes authorize."
.
Doing the sums, 1,788 applications in 365 days (assuming they work over over Christmas and weekeneds etc) means they process almost 5 applications per day. One wonders how rigorous the review process can be under such deadlines.