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The Intercept Releases First Batch Of New Docs Leaked By Snowden (theintercept.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the first-batch dept.

executioner quotes a report from The Intercept: The Intercept's first SIDtoday release comprises 166 articles, including all articles published between March 31, 2003, when SIDtoday began, and June 30, 2003, plus installments of all article series begun during this period through the end of the year. Major topics include the National Security Agency's role in interrogations, the Iraq War, the war on terror, new leadership in the Signals Intelligence Directorate, and new, popular uses of the internet and of mobile computing devices. You can download this batch directly here, or download the documents via Github.

55 comments

  1. Panama Papers, Ed Snowden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    How about instead of this batch release nonsense we dump all of the data and get the public outrage all of the way at once, instead of spoonfeeding it to the masses at the controlling entities' behest?

    1. Re:Panama Papers, Ed Snowden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      How about instead of this batch release nonsense we dump all of the data and get the public outrage all of the way at once, instead of spoonfeeding it to the masses at the controlling entities' behest?

      The public's collective memory is short.

      The thinking is that when you keep it in the news, no one will forget.

      Of course, that can backfire when everyone becomes numb to the stories.

    2. Re:Panama Papers, Ed Snowden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      Ahh, yeah, so it's okay to use public outrage as a tool when it serves causes you believe in. Got it.

    3. Re:Panama Papers, Ed Snowden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      How about instead of this batch release nonsense we dump all of the data and get the public outrage all of the way at once, instead of spoonfeeding it to the masses at the controlling entities' behest?

      The public's collective memory is short.

      The thinking is that when you keep it in the news, no one will forget.

      Of course, that can backfire when everyone becomes numb to the stories.

      It will backfire the second you admit to someone interested in the facts of the matter that you are withholding them for dramatic effect.
      Your agenda is then obviously dramatic effect, not transparency.

    4. Re:Panama Papers, Ed Snowden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      N-n-n-n-nailed it.

      Then again, as the voting here shows you, if you do anything besides put Ed Snowden and anyone associated with his leaking of data on a pedestal, you've already lost. People don't give a flying fuck about content: they care about the presentation.

  2. Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    What else will they do to keep this clown in the news?

    1. Re:Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh, and did I mention the likelyhood that /. has been purchased by a political action committee?
      Seems more likely every day

    2. Re:Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "I hate Edward Snowden because he's popular!"

    3. Re:Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yes... because national security is a popularity contest

    4. Re:Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're not talking about national security.

    5. Re:Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      Not a single person has proven to be harmed by these leaks. Fuck off, shill.

    6. Re:Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      nasty, nasty there mr foulmouth

      It is not the nature of security agencies to make their dead agents public

      That being said, either the information was valuable and people are dead, or worthless and nobody got hurt

      take a choice, but you cannot choose "valuable, but nobody got hurt" because this is not some bowdlerized fairy tale

    7. Re: Yaaaawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The self-serving corporate overlords in the media are unwilling to admit that anyone's been hurt. Of course, you can read all about countermeasures in terrorist training manuals, so take your own conclusions. You've been sold to the highest bidders, by the media, you stupid fuck.

    8. Re:Yaaaawn by davester666 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yes, you can, idiot boy.

      It is valuable to know that the NSA was tracking every phone number dialed in America. Who called who.

      And yet, nobody was killed because we found out the NSA was doing this.

      Hell, the NSA thinks MAYBE all these phone numbers assisted with 2 terrorist related events. At least, that's what they told Congress, under oath.

      Of course, the FBI is going "whee!"

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    9. Re:Yaaaawn by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Hell, the NSA thinks MAYBE all these phone numbers assisted with 2 terrorist related events. At least, that's what they told Congress, under oath.

      In an unclassified environment.

      Most of this stuff is classified, you can go to federal prison for talking about it in unclassified environments. Take from that what you will.

      I would say that the crap in Ukraine can directly be attributed to the leaks, as Russia learned how to work around the intelligence agencies so that their movement to annex parts of the Ukraine was not detected until it was too late.

      I would also expect that the Paris attacks could have been stopped with the access they allegedly had.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    10. Re:Yaaaawn by davester666 · · Score: 1

      Yeah, that's the trick. You just make your failure "classified".

      And there is no chance anything Snowden released surpised Russia. They have well funded, very experienced foreign and domestic spying agencies.

      I would expect that only the dumbest, most naive "terrorist" would get caught using the stuff Snowden released. What catches terrorists is hard work, boots on the grounds. Trying to do it sitting behind a desk gets people killed.

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    11. Re:Yaaaawn by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      http://www.theguardian.com/wor...

      Russian guard service reverts to typewriters after NSA leaks

      Yeah, nothing at all surprised Russia about the leaks, they changed to typewriters and couriers because of their normal paranoia.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    12. Re:Yaaaawn by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      The "they" you refer to being, of course, the NSA, CIA and other agencies who keep on doing illegal things in secret and then writing reports about it so that people can leak them and expose them to the unwanted glare of public scrutiny?

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
  3. Excerpt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    05/15/2003

    CIA> We'll stop the waterboarding if you tell use where the WMD are located.
    Captured Iraqi> But haven't had them in decades!
    CIA> To POTUS: There are no WMD in Iraq.
    Bush> To Congress: We stopped Saddam Hussein just in time from using WMD against our country.

    1. Re:Excerpt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      05/15/2003

      CIA> We'll stop the waterboarding if you tell use where the WMD are located.
      Captured Iraqi> But haven't had them in decades!
      CIA> To POTUS: There are no WMD in Iraq.
      Bush> To Congress: We stopped Saddam Hussein just in time from using WMD against our country.

      Jesus, stop using the term POTUS, It sounds like a moldy potato, not a political office!
      don't even get me started on the STD that SCOTUS sounds like!

      The people that com up with these abbreviations are idiots.. I think it is the same idiot that had the tea party referring to themselves as "Tea Baggers".

    2. Re:Excerpt by matchhead650 · · Score: 1

      The term POTUS may sound "like a moldy potato" but it is the official acronym, it's better than some of the others VPOTUS (Vice President), FLOTUS (First Lady), SLOTUS (Second Lady). These are acronym's POTUS = President of the United States, not abbreviations

    3. Re:Excerpt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They are not acronyms, they are initialisms. Acronyms make words.

  4. Office Newsletter. Huh. by pushing-robot · · Score: 1

    Slow leaks day?

    --
    How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    1. Re:Office Newsletter. Huh. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are some interesting things in there, For example:

      from 2003-04-22_SIDToday_-__Dynamic_Methods_of_Interaction_with_New_and_Existing_Customers.pdf:

      “(S//SI) Our customers have challenged us to change with them,
      anticipate their needs, and collaborate with them on the way
      ahead. In that spirit, Customer Response has several new and
      dynamic dissemination products coming to “market” that include:

      SECRET Over-the Internet –Particularly attractive to Law
      Enforcement–a cross-organizational effort to provide
      SECRET-level data to an unclassified workstation, in a non-
      SCIF (sensitive compartmented information facility) area,
      over the commercial Internet. The destination workstation
      would remain unclassified.”

      So the NSA set up at insecure computers with uncontrolled access terminals with with secret information on the open internet. Didn't Manning get 35 years for this?

  5. And considering the content... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    of what was released, it proves Snowden did nothing wrong, but that won't stop the Republicans for calling for his death.

    captcha: snowshoe. So close.

    1. Re: And considering the content... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Republicans hate anything that helps the people.

    2. Re: And considering the content... by Opportunist · · Score: 1, Flamebait

      Actually, they hate what keeps them from accumulating more money. That it hurts the country is just a side effect. Nobody is evil for evil's sake, it's just simple greed, that's all.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  6. That is how Snowden has been contained by Trachman · · Score: 1

    CIA (and many other agencies) spends a ton of money on AWS (Amazon Web Services). Jeff Bezos is an owner of Amazon. Same Jeff Bezos funds the website intercept, which becomes a non-productive avenue to publich Snowden's revelations.

    Many of the Snowden's revelations were already known, and his leak did a great public service.

    That being said, Snowden's files were expected to be a never ending source of new exciting revelations. Did not happen. Greenwald was bought off, but he didn't know it at that time.

  7. This should be excellent reading. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    For all the IT/Infosec experts among us this should provide great insight into the evolution of this warrantless surveillance state we find ourselves subjected to.

  8. Nobody cares. by captaindomon · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The most interesting thing to me about the whole Snowden thing, is that nobody really cares. The stuff that he leaked are things that most people thought were happening already. In general, the leaks got a kind of "meh" response from the world. What that says about the world is something to talk about, but I find it interesting that there's not really anything that interesting to the public. It's not like they found proof of alien autopsies or something. Just your normal "we're a spy agency run by the United States" type of stuff.

    --
    Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
    1. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      It's just fodder for the low political literacy crowd. The leftist nutjobs have put him on their "hero of the people" pedestal, the right-wing nutjobs wanted his head as soon as someone could frame the leak in a treasonous tone, meanwhile anyone with any familiarity with the PATRIOT act was already out of breath from half a decade of complaining that the exact kind of shit Snowden leaked was already legal.

    2. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't think it's quite accurate to say everybody thought this was going on. There have been studies showing that people are changing their behaviors online and are becoming more afraid to speak out on controversial issues as a result of the revelations. It would be more accurate to say that most simply don't care or think it's okay as opposed to the minority that do.

    3. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More than likely this was an attempt to get Millenials to become paranoid about the government and quit voting

      It's form and content are very similar to old John Birch Society propaganda about how Wilson and the dime were commie plots

      IMO, the sons of the JBS (koch bros) are fixated on getting Millenials to disenfranchise themselves and threw a pile o money at greenwald to make it happen

    4. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

      Relations between the US and Germany, Israel, Russia, China and a number of other nations have been set back years if not decades based on the snowden revelations. I'd hardly call that a "meh" response. Theres a lot going on under the covers you don't know about that has far reaching implications for the world and the USA.

      The US got its hand caught in the cookie jar and a lot of people are really pissed about it.

    5. Re:Nobody cares. by Wraithlyn · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Before the leaks: "LOL stupid conspiratard thinking the govt spies on everyone, put your tinfoil hat back on" (don't tell me you never saw sentiments like this)

      After the leaks: "Well duhh, of course the govt spies on everyone stupid. Everybody knows that, that's been common knowledge 4evar!"

      TL;DR there's always assholes saying "nothing to see here".

      --
      "Mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent present in every electron." -Freeman Dyson
    6. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No. Everyone who used to argue with me about FBI and NSA spying has been very sheepish post Snowden. I don't even have to say "I told you so." And none of them want to defend the lies and subterfuge fed to the press by the security apparatus. None of them think electronic messages should be exempt from privacy and they don't really want to sneak off to the park and make sure they aren't followed to exercise what they were told in grade school was somehow "inalienable." We've been alienated. People care deeply, but they do not think the solution is within gov't. The solution being pursued is to up the game in the private sector. Movements like Let's Encrypt, Apple defaulting to secure crypto, WhatsApp deploying crypto, etc. Once people no long think the NSA is protecting them, they seek solutions outside their reach. They already know the agency is immune to Congressional oversight.

    7. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The most interesting thing to me about the whole Snowden thing, is that nobody really cares.

      Only ignorant people don't care. The rest of us can't do much about it.

    8. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The US got its hand caught in the cookie jar and a lot of people are really pissed about it.

      Many different countries got caught with their hands in the cookie jar and a lot of people from those countries are pissed at the US, but very eager to excuse their own government, for it.

    9. Re:Nobody cares. by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 4, Interesting

      nobody cares because the press is afraid to do their jobs. they are spoon fed shit from the government and other Big Things(tm) and they are not going to bite the hand. this is how things have been for over 20 years, now. our press is castrated and useless.

      people are not told what is going on. how many people have read about the widespread h1b abuse? no one. every normie I talk to and tell this about, its all new to them. they act (and its real) like they never heard anything about this.

      the news does not do their job. they are like domesticated dogs. they learned that they could be wild and fight for food, or be tame and get food for just begging and being 'good' to humans. the media is called a lapdog and its not a coincidence.

      control the media and you control the message. our government learned that well and, sadly, executed well on it.

      our people are kept ignorant by 'news' and 'entertainment' (including sports and the latest R vs D distraction).

      they have it down to a science. they really do.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    10. Re:Nobody cares. by CaptainDork · · Score: 1

      This.

      And, in that family of ideas, we have the "privacy," issue.

      People don't give a flying fuck about privacy.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    11. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      NO SORRY, the massive intrusion, harvesting, datamining and thereby control of your soul by your government IS NOT NORMAL.
      It is a country and government apparatus that has become SELF AWARE and is now taking UNPRECEDENTED ALL MEASURES to SELF PRESERVATION.
      Not alien autopsies, Snowden simply didn't have access to that compartment, nor did he have access to anything crypto.
      But his access did PROVE that SKYNET is now fully aware of and very much against us normals, not just around the world, but more importantly, STATESIDE.

      SHUT IT DOWN, NOW!!!

    12. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The most interesting thing to me about the whole Snowden thing, is that nobody really cares.

      Sure. Except for the people who scream "Traitor!" any chance they get. Or the people wanting him shot dead on sight.

      Strange, that.

    13. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      9/11 was masterminded by the Israeli Mossad.

    14. Re:Nobody cares. by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      People do care. Privacy has become a selling point. Without Snowden I doubt that both major mobile operating systems would be going to unbreakable encryption by default, and strongly resisting attempts by governments and law enforcement to create back doors.

      The internet has changed a lot since Snowden. Encryption is a lot more common now. There is a sense of urgency that everything should be encrypted, from the most mundane web site to all communications. Look at the number of encrypted chat apps that exist now, and how most of the popular ones have implemented encryption.

      We always knew that GCHQ worked closely with the NSA, but he revelation that they are basically a subsidiary and guilty of many millions of crimes was still quite a shock to most people. It has lead to legal challenges and a proposed change in the law to make what they are doing legal, which has brought attention to the issue and a lot of on-going debate about it.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    15. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are quite right. In fact, I would go so far as to bet that parent of your post was one of those who said such "LOL stupid conspiratard..." things. If he was not, he would be aware that you could not discuss this stuff in any "normal" chat place at all on the web without being called a conspiracy theorist, or at best be met with total silence and quick change of subject.

    16. Re:Nobody cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fuck you, stupid asshole. Few questioned that the government was spying on everyone, though some disagreed to the extent of such spying. It's the 9/11 truthers, chemtrail dipshits, FEMA cocksuckers and the like that comprise the group you so accurately call conspiratards. Basically anyone that would listen to your boy Alex Jones.

  9. So what's the latest? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Anna Nicole Smith still dead?

  10. NSA propaganda by zedaroca · · Score: 1

    So now, instead of knowing what they were doing against the world (including America), we are going to read their marketing team's newsletter. With all the travel abroad and be important for your country stuff. Disgusting.

  11. Everyone in IT security cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you don't care, it suggests that you have no interest in computer security, which in turn suggests that this is probably the wrong forum for you.

    Snowden's revelations have had an absolutely massive worldwide effect on everyone in the industry, from the lowliest techie with an interest in their personal privacy and machine security, all the way up to the largest megacorps like Google and Apple. What's more, it has dramatically altered the encryption landscape in everyday computing, focused many developer minds on cryptography, and made TLS universal.

    To hear someone say "Nobody cares" is really kinda funny. While funny, the remark has no factual basis.

    1. Re:Everyone in IT security cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your lack of understanding is amusing

      I do not want criminals to get into my stuff because they will take my money

      I do not give a rats ass if the government gets into my stuff because 1, I can't stop them and 2, they will not take my money

    2. Re: Everyone in IT security cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If the government can get into your stuff so can the criminals.. Even with the far out presumption that the two are always mutually exclusive.

    3. Re:Everyone in IT security cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Your lack of understanding is amusing.

      There is no technical difference between criminals getting into your stuff and the government getting into your stuff. Security is an equal opportunities provider.

      And that's why if you do not want criminals getting into your stuff and taking your money, you'd better be secure against all other parties gaining access too.

    4. Re: Everyone in IT security cares. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The government doesn't want your money, it's useless to them, and they can print their own. What they want is for you to let them do whatever they want. So they want to keep you too busy, and too self-absorbed, to care what they do. So the cost of living is still just beyond our paycheques, no matter what they are, and no matter that we're an order of magnitude more productive than ever. We should be down to just working two days a week, spending the rest on civic activities.

        Furthermore, the anonymity that is required in order to expose corruption, and is required in order to ensure that votes cannot be sold, is dependant upon an open-standard net and an open source computing. And these are quickly being replaced by the app environment connected through the cell networks where encryption cannot be trusted and anonymity cannot be maintained.

  12. Music to read by. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    https://vid.me/O6Bq

  13. Camp Wannawarya by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The tone and substance of many of these "newsletters" is disturbingly inane, much like the ridiculous motivational posters some HR person decided to put up, as our old company was falling apart around her. Seriously, Beaver Tails? April Fools? Kristmas Krypto Klub? Perhaps they are top secret to avoid public ridicule, although I hope that last one is just a measure of SID's blinkered gung-ho cluelessness, and not what it appears to be.

    At least we have the Geospatial Exploitation Office! We were running seriously low on exploitation, right?