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AT&T Helped the NSA Spy On Internet Traffic
An anonymous reader writes: Newly disclosed NSA documents show that the agency gained access to billions of emails through a "highly collaborative" relationship with AT&T. The company provided access from 2003 to 2013, including technical assistance to carry out court orders permitting wiretapping. "The company installed surveillance equipment in at least 17 of its Internet hubs on American soil, far more than its similarly sized competitor, Verizon. And its engineers were the first to try out new surveillance technologies invented by the eavesdropping agency. One document reminds NSA officials to be polite when visiting AT&T facilities, noting, 'This is a partnership, not a contractual relationship.'" The new files don't indicate whether the partnership currently exists, but the government has been doing its best to keep corporate partnerships hidden. The article also notes that "In 2011, AT&T began handing over 1.1 billion domestic cellphone calling records a day to the N.S.A. after 'a push to get this flow operational prior to the 10th anniversary of 9/11,' according to an internal agency newsletter."
is this really news? wasnt it AT&T who we knew had a secret room in one of their buildings years ago??
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Of course AT&T had a choice, they could have gone to court. That would have stopped it right there. What could the NSA do, shut them down? And yes, this is news because the level of spying and complicity is even worse than previously reported. I am sure as more leaks come out, it will turn out to be far worse still.
The tech savvy crowd here at /. should be enraged that this is what our government is doing to the Internet. But maybe now that we have heard so much crap about what the government does that it just induces a yawn. I suppose that is a good thing for the NSA. I personally am outraged.
A brain is a terrible thing to waste... Mind? That's debatable.
Room 641A is located in the SBC Communications building at 611 Folsom Street, San Francisco, three floors of which were occupied by AT&T before SBC purchased AT&T.[1] The room was referred to in internal AT&T documents as the SG3 [Study Group 3] Secure Room. It is fed by fiber optic lines from beam splitters installed in fiber optic trunks carrying Internet backbone traffic[3] and, as analyzed by J. Scott Marcus, a former CTO for GTE and a former adviser to the FCC, has access to all Internet traffic that passes through the building, and therefore "the capability to enable surveillance and analysis of internet content on a massive scale, including both overseas and purely domestic traffic."[4] Former director of the NSA's World Geopolitical and Military Analysis Reporting Group, William Binney, has estimated that 10 to 20 such facilities have been installed throughout the United States.[2]
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I worked as a switch technician at several MCI Points Of Presence during the 80's/90's - this kind of thing was going on at several Central Offices - generally all the main POPs for a metro area have a locked "wiretap room" that only people with badges and guns can get into and out of - it was verboten for use CO techs to enter, see, or even mention these rooms even exist, but they do. Israel provided much of the tech for the FBI and other agencies in the COs. There are also many COG/COOP sites with direct connections to hardened telecom networks and peering stations. I saw one such box with single mode fiber running in/out at the original MAE-EAST parking garage - but back then it was just another switch/router in the core.
Sadly, nothing new here.
Trump up criminal charges and get the CEO of AT&T thrown into pound-me-in-the-ass Federal Prison, just like they did to the only telecom executive to refuse them. This ain't the bush leagues.
Of course AT&T had a choice, they could have gone to court. That would have stopped it right there. What could the NSA do, shut them down?
Well, the NSA/Government could cancel your government contracts, begin investigating you for insider trading, and jail your CEO for 6 years...