Slashdot Mirror
DHS Set To Destroy "Einstein" Surveillance Records
schwit1 sends word that The Department of Homeland Security plans on disposing of all the records from a 3-year-long surveillance program without letting the public have access to them. The Department of Homeland Security is poised to ditch all records from a controversial network monitoring system called "Einstein" that are at least three years old, but not for security reasons. DHS reasons the files — which include data about traffic to government websites, agency network intrusions and general vulnerabilities — have no research significance. But some security experts say, to the contrary, DHS would be deleting a treasure chest of historical threat data. And privacy experts, who wish the metadata wasn't collected at all, say destroying it could eliminate evidence that the government wide surveillance system does not perform as intended. The National Archives and Records Administration has tentatively approved the disposal plan, pending a public comment period.
Short version: this is a bunch of IDS logs and similar data that DHS (mainly US-CERT) has kept from various federal agencies. This isn't secretly collected information, it's records of things being sent to the government (email, web traffic, whatever). According to TFA, Civil Libertarians are apparently for the deletion, because releasing it means everyone gets to see what you sent the government. This assumes (and that's a big if) that there's nothing in there that DHS wants to hide. SANS doesn't think it should be deleted after only three years, because they think the research data (for intrusion activity) is still relevant (and by comparison SANS keeps theirs for 12 years).
I mean, no one — not even you — has any evidence of it.
except we do. the docs snowden leaked contain entries going back to around ~2005 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_%28surveillance_program%29 PRISM is a clandestine anti-terrorism[1] mass electronic surveillance data mining program launched in 2007 by the National Security Agency (NSA) and government survialence has been consistantly leaked on slashdot since it started in 1997, going back to CARNIVORE, RAPTORE, and this: Narus
Citation needed.
This is the war on drugs
Reagan declares war
This is parellel construction, basicly allowing cops to either plant evidence, and effectively nullifies reasonable suspicion.
This is civil foreiture. As you can see, the government can now just take your stuff without having to provide evidence
far less conviction in a court of law, jury of peers or not
Empty words.
hey mr pot, the kettle called, your fucking black.
Keep in mind that Einstein is a DHS program for monitoring the security of government networks from an internal point of view. It consolidates information from participating agencies' firewalls, intrusion detection systems, malware detection, anti-virus scanners, etc,. It has nothing to do with monitoring anyone or anything aside from government-owned systems, government-owned internal networks (i.e. the LAN in a government office building), and the actions of government employees using those internal government-owned stems and networks. In other words, it's exactly the same sort of thing every major company, university, or other organization does in their security operations centers.
Whether or not the data should be kept around for research purposes is a worthwhile question, although publishing it would require a lot of sanitization to avoid revealing data that would be useful to attackers (for instance, the name, IP address, and precise version number of every firewall within a given agency).
But in this case it's not about covering up any surveillance or information gathering on public behavior.
How about records of one or more government agencies intruding into other government agency's or branch's networks?
For instance, could there be evidence contained in those logs of TLAs intruding into the networks of Congress, the SCOTUS, etc?
Never mind TLAs spying on normal everyday citizens. The Executive Branch has been quite cavalier of late in spying on those in the other branches of government, particularly when said other branches may be deciding whether or not to exercise their duty and ability to limit the Executive Branch's power and scope.
This data could provide hard evidence regarding just how extensive and pervasive these practices have become.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
We have a two-party system because all the little factions band together to seize the presidency, an enormous prize with veto.
That's the difference. To fix means altering the president's power, which will never happen.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.