Leaked 'Standing Rock' Documents Reveal Invasive Counterterrorism Measures (theintercept.com)

An anonymous reader writes: "A shadowy international mercenary and security firm known as TigerSwan targeted the movement opposed to the Dakota Access Pipeline with military-style counterterrorism measures," reports The Intercept, decrying "the fusion of public and private intelligence operations." Saying the private firm started as a war-on-terror contractor for the U.S. military and State Department, the site details "sweeping and invasive" surveillance of protesters, citing over 100 documents leaked by one of the firm's contractors.

The documents show TigerSwan even havested information about the protesters from social media, and "provide extensive evidence of aerial surveillance and radio eavesdropping, as well as infiltration of camps and activist circles... The leaked materials not only highlight TigerSwan's militaristic approach to protecting its client's interests but also the company's profit-driven imperative to portray the nonviolent water protector movement as unpredictable and menacing enough to justify the continued need for extraordinary security measures... Internal TigerSwan communications describe the movement as 'an ideologically driven insurgency with a strong religious component' and compare the anti-pipeline water protectors to jihadist fighters."
The Intercept reports that recently "the company's role has expanded to include the surveillance of activist networks marginally related to the pipeline, with TigerSwan agents monitoring 'anti-Trump' protests from Chicago to Washington, D.C., as well as warning its client of growing dissent around other pipelines across the country." They also report that TigerSwan "has operated without a license in North Dakota for the entirety of the pipeline security operation."

Comments

Priorities

[Pikoro]

And this is legal how? Yet, don't copy that floppy or you'll get 10 years in a FPMITA prison.

Re: Priorities

[quonset]

Many of the protesters, like my roommate, were paid

Of course they were. And Santa Claus helped as well since it's his off season.

This is like listening to RT or the lies coming out of Putin's mouth. Any time anyone disagrees with the government confiscating people's lands they're suddenly "subversive" or an "NGO" whose sole job is to take down the government.

The amount of disinformation is staggering and the worst part is the uneducated deplorables who voted for the con artist believe it.

Re: Priorities

[ScentCone]

Did the protestors engage in anything illegal?

Yes. We don't even have to get into the gigantic mountain of trash they left once they weather turned and they went home. They trespassed repeatedly, blocked public roads - plenty of illegal things. But because they were well funded and backed by know-nothing celebrities, the usual get-yourself-arrested stuff wasn't worth the trouble to prosecute. It was obvious they were going to pull an Occupy Everything and wander off when it became inconvenient to stay. But other people still had to spend weeks cleaning up after them and trucking off their trash and abandoned dogs.

Re: Priorities

[JaredOfEuropa]

That sounds a lot like what we call "public insubordination" around here, nothing terrible. Don't get me wrong, I don't know anything about the rights and wrongs around this particular pipeline, but in case of local protests against infrastructural projects I almost invariably find myself opposed to the protestors after weighing the pros and cons. Not a fan of tree-huggers... especially "professional" ones. But it sure sounds like whatever TigerSwan got up to is a real concern for any liberty-minded citizen, even if what they did turns out to be technically legal, and even if they happen to be on the right side of this issue.

Re: Priorities

[dbIII]

gigantic mountain of trash ... trespassed

Ah - then unconstitutional search and seizure is fully justified in protecting the motherland komrade - carry on.

Re: Priorities

[interkin3tic]

Citation needed, because my roommate says no they weren't paid. He also says your roommate was paid to do a cheap smear job on people who legitimately were upset about climate change and polluting the water of an Indian reservation. He is currently fighting your roommate and your roommate is crying and pissing his pants and is sincerely sorry he was such a douchebag. However both our roommates know your roommate is still a douchebag and will probably go right back to spreading misinformation for the right wing.

Source: my other roommate says so.

Re: Priorities

[Anonymous Coward]

No, actually, the ACLU has fought for the KKK to get parade permits.

The ACLU should fight for American Civil Liberties. It is in the name. Their work is even more precious now than ever. Civil liberties does not mean just protecting causes you like.

Where Trump and his ilk can never ever be forgiven is not a freedom of speech or protest issue. He has the freedom of speech. His supporters have the right to protest and all the rest. We dare not take either away.

What can not and must not ever be forgiven is the attack on truth and the press and all rational voices of reason. To Trump nothing matters but winning. How doesn't matter. The subject matter doesn't matter. Do you think he cares about health care, that it is the cause of his life? Please, he doesn't appear to care at all beyond using it as a piggy bank to finance tax cuts that likely benefit himself disproportionately.

He manipulated the media to keep their eyes on him. He treated his much more qualified opponents like children by calling them childish names, and wouldn't you know it, I think almost every attack he made was something he himself was guilty of. Lying Ted. Crooked Hillary. He frequently and repeatedly accused experts of being complete and total morons, while saying only he knew the secret plan, and people bought it and still buy it. Hell a guy just body slammed a reporter and many of Trump's supporters think that is just and right.

Many seek the Road Map to Peace for the Israel Palestine conflict, but make no mistake people, with Trump we have our own Journey and I rather fear it will be more like a Nature Trail to Hell. Trump's bravado has already failed on North Korea, and if anything actually accelerated their efforts. That alone is an almost unsolvable problem. Bravado won't fix it. Our invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan probably precipitated their faster development. A military solution might be required. The key is to somehow make China comfortable with a reunited Korea and then maybe announce a plan to take back the land over a period of 30 years or something and I have no idea how to do that. If you could manage that, then If every move was careful, and you didn't threaten North Korea's current leaders you might survive a game of brinkmanship, maybe, but I sure as hell would not want a President Trump involved in such a mess. I'd rather have any of the other republicans first, well except Cruz. Clinton would also have worked.

Seriously, problems on the scale of North Korea are what our president _Must_ handle, and this guy just isn't qualified or capable. Twitter seems the extent of his talent. You can't just make a deal with North Korea since they are not trustworthly, or at the very least any deal must be heavy on the verify.

Hell, even if the US could make a deal with North Korea or any part of the world, it is nearly impossible now that we have Don the Con as president. Seriously, unless it is backed up with legislation from the Congress, who is going to trust us? One of the main German newspapers is calling for his impeachment and the new leader of the free world Angela Merkel has just said he can't be trusted.

The _only_ chance he has to salvage his presidency is to somehow have some epiphany, then turn over his taxes and all the rest and start cooperating with the investigations fully. If he did that and just stopped lying, the American people would probably forgive him and reelect him. We are stupid like that.

Re: Priorities

[youngone]

This kind of thing has been SOP for the US Government for a very long time, after all, it's how Pinkerton got going.

Anytime Americans have taken a stance that conflicts with the status quo, there has been violence:

The Haymarket Riot is just one of many occasions the US Government in it's many forms has used violence against workers.

Re: Priorities

[Pseudonym]

In case anyone didn't read that story: It doesn't claim that "many of the protesters were proven to be paid". It claims that the organisers accepted donations.

Professional organisation is completely normal on all sides of politics. People are paid to organise both pro-Trump and anti-Trump rallies because they are complex events which require professional expertise to pull off successfully. This is especially true if you're doing it 100% legally, where there are regulations and permits to take care of. As protests scale up, you need people who know what they are doing. That's the nature of the beast.

This is not even remotely the same thing as paying people just to show up.

Re: Priorities

[ooloorie]

Ah - then unconstitutional search and seizure is fully justified in protecting the motherland komrade - carry on.

TFA is about a private company. Private companies cannot engage in "unconstitutional search and seizure" because they can't engage in "search and seizure" at all; that's a right reserved to the government.

Private companies do have a constitutional right to "harvest information about the protesters from social media", engage in "aerial surveillance and radio eavesdropping", and "infiltrate camps and activist circles" (as long as they don't violate private property rights or break into computer systems illegally).

Those are rights that we have because we live in a free society. People like you have not yet succeeded turning the US into a totalitarian state, much as you may want to, "komrade".

Re:Priorities

[dwillden]

It's legal because TigerSwan was not operating on behalf of the government. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights restrict the actions of the government and of private companies and individuals acting on behalf of the government.

TigerSwan was acting on behalf of the Pipeline company, which having invested large sums and built nearly the entire pipeline before this even became an issue, had a right to try to protect their operations and investment from protestors trying to damage their operations and equipment. TigerSwan broke no laws in their collection of information about potential threats to their employer's equipment, personnel and operations.

Such a security company would of course be in contact with police agencies. I would be more concerned had they been operating without such contacts. The fact that they are passing information about what they are observing and their actions, indicates that they were concerned about not stepping across the line into illegal actions.

If someone can point to documents showing where the government agencies (local, state or federal) tasked them to collect such information then we have crossed into illegal actions. But all this "report" states is that they coordinated with law enforcement which means they provided information about what they were doing and seeing. Unless tasked to collect the information (thus making them an agent of the government) they are free to collect any information they so choose (as long as the collection method is not illegal but this article gave no indication of such).

Disagreeing with the pipeline does not make the pipeline company, or it's security company lawbreakers. Before you claim illegal or unconstitutional activities, you must know what qualifies as such.

Re: Priorities

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh gosh, to mean the left is so terrible as to require open and public documentation of who is seeking to influence the government?

And then they expect to have the right to comment, criticize, and reject other people whose actions they find objectionable? My word, the horror.

Why, it is just like the boycott of South Africa over apartheid. Truly, the left is an abomination.

Of course, the fact that the hypocritical right calls for the firing or arrest of people who disagree with their views, tends to spoil your moral indignation. I've even heard a lot of Trump supporters say that people who oppose him should be deported.

Yammer all you want, you are just a phony.

Re: Priorities

[Anonymous Coward]

>> Did the protestors engage in anything illegal?
>
> Yes.

So did Rosa Parks.

Fuckwit.

Re:Priorities

[Anonymous Coward]

It's legal because TigerSwan was not operating on behalf of the government. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights restrict the actions of the government and of private companies and individuals acting on behalf of the government.

Absolutely false: nothing in the Bill of Rights prevents the application of fundamental rights against private entities. Claims to the contrary are pure myth. Certain specific items, such as the 1st Amendment, are limited to specific government entities - though even in these cases the 14th Amendment muddies the waters.

The open-ended items such as the 9th Amendment (unspecified rights retained by the people) and the the 10th Amendment (the part about unspecified rights reserved to the people) are not at all limited to government. One of the most important rights arising here is the right to ethical practice of law, which certainly limits private entities - and nothing prevents the assertion of other rights, such as the right to ethics in business, or the right to privacy with respect to business activities as well as government.

The Founding Fathers were well aware of the danger posed by private entities to liberty: it was a very important part of the Roman history they studied, and also part of their own lives in the form of companies such as the East India Company.

Terrorists

[AK Marc]

The definition of "terrorist" is "anyone you don't like". And private contractors will turn people into proven terrorists, for a fee. Gotta love the free market.

Activists as jihadists

[manu0601]

Considering activists as jihadists is the first step. Then you consider jihadists have been considered illegal fighters (a term invented to spare international laws on war), and you can send an activist straight to Guantanamo. Brilliant.

Re:Link for standing rock pollution

[h33t l4x0r]

They left their tents and gear behind (and yes some trash) because they were arrested. That doesn't make them bad hippies.

Re:Not Counterterrorism, Counter-Espionage...

[Darinbob]

The pipeline people were paid by the corporations anyway. None of the oil goes to America anyway, it's being refined and sent to China. Whining about paid protesters while ignoring the paid mercenaries hired by corporations seems like a stretch.

Oil companies have lots of money

[Applehu Akbar]

I wish the builders of other infrastructure could afford a counter protest force like this one. We could get that telescope built on Maunakea, get some new-generation nuclear plants started if we wished to get serious about carbon, and California could finally finish its bullet train.

If you want an end to this

[rsilvergun]

Take care of the poor. Outside of the occasional loon organized terror only works because we've got millions (billions?) that lack food security. Said it before, will probably say it again: you abandon your poor at your peril.

Super Shadowy

[JBMcB]

All hush-hush top secret shadow organizations have a web site.

http://www.tigerswan.com/

And twitter feed.

https://twitter.com/TigerSwan

Pinkertons, Debs, and the Unions

[goombah99]

Boy this is Deja Vu. It's exactly what happened with the Unions, the Pinkerton Detective agency and the tacit support of the US government in the early part of last century. Look up Eugene Debs in Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... He helped form the first nation wide trade union in the US (for the trains). And when they struck the Pullman company arranged with the complicity of the US govt to acquire the US mail contract making it a federal crime not to couple pulman cars to trains. Along the way someone set off a bomb (probably the pinkertons to frame the union strikers) and the entire union leadership was imprisoned. there's a nice picture of them all in their sunday best taken together in jail on the wikipedia site. (ironically in Woodstock, a place more known for 60s rock concerts now) . While in prison together Debs started reading various socialist literature and when they were release formed the Socialist party in the USA. He ran for president several times getting millions of votes (6% of the popular vote). He became famous for a stump speech saying no working class person should be going to fight in World War II because it's just a richmans war making the munitions makers richer and killing the poor. He was arrested for treason and sedition, sentenced to 10 years in prison, stripped of his own right to vote, and still ran for president (getting 3.4% of the popular vote while in his jail cell). In the court room when asked to recant he said

"Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free."

While in prison he started the Prison Reform movement, and President Harding pardoned him partly hoping to quash that. He was nominated for the Nobel peace prize for his astute portrayl of World War I as the Capitalist war.

Nearly every use of the Sedition act has been against political prisoners and frequently for union busting.

Re:Not Counterterrorism, Counter-Espionage...

[sjames]

You didn't do the math, did you. The tribal council accepted $375,000. Assuming they passed 100% on to the protesters, that comes to the lordly sum of $125 each. Wow, they must be living large now in their new Lambos.

Stop virtue signalling

[AHuxley]

When people protested in East Germany, people who risked at lot by using a television camera did not get caught.

Dont use your own equipment. If your wealthy enough to be able to afford to protest all day, buy an older weather sealed dslr camera and lens. No need for in camera wifi. Use the card to get your files to a computer of editing and upload later.
Ensure the serial number in the camera is not linked to your name with every file uploaded or created.
Take some images and video of the protest. Remove any camera serial numbers in the files, edit, add a voice over and your groups logo and branding, compress, then upload it using some existing network and on a computer that won't be used later.
Do not take a "computer" thats "fast" or "sealed against the weather" from protest to protest. Dont use wifi or networking from your computer like device.
Sneaker net your video file to a final separate, cheap device just for fast networking.

All MAC and any other unique details about all networks will be collected on.
Think about what device connects to that final network to send a file to the world. A random strangers offer of a free network, computer help could be an undercover contractor or police wanting to get more direct access to your hardware and software, OS.
Protect your devices and equipment from digital tracking and "new" best friends or "smart" friendly strangers with free offers of help.
Police and contractors can be anyone, thats why they are doing undercover work in protests. Some are past protesters who had to make a deal with the police to stay free. They have to collect it all and work very hard at making new friends.
While a protester might have been taking years of French or arts at some liberal university, police and contractors learned how to become "protesters" over the years.
The undercover officers offers will be for device access to help with "media" or "editing"

Every face at a protest will be stored for facial recognition. Any and all networks or networked devices will be collected on.
Read up on what the NSA, GCHQ, CIA and other 5 eye nations do when they "collect it all".
The same ability is now on the open market at a low cost for a city, state or contractor. Dont trust any hardware, software or OS thats been near a protest after a protest.
Anyone could have added code, altered the device, accessed the OS or collected its network details.
Ensure the only collection a city or federal gov or its contractors can do is facial recognition. Keep your hardware and software way from their networks.
A streaming cell phone is great for recoding an event and not having data erased on site but it comes with the cost of collection and device or OS alteration.
Dont bring malware pushed down a network home after a protest. If your security aware, use dedicated devices as bait and see if any devices are altered. Study bait hardware later under Tempest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... conditions but don't allow your own deices to get altered to test for such gov/police/contractor pushed malware.

The final thing to consider is the new stranger in your group. Get them talking about their past and get their image and see what different free and other image search products find online.
City or state contractors might not have the skills to remove all past images or their story will not mach a few traces found online.
Federal and contractors working undercover have the ability to rewrite online social media so their undercover "story" will mach perfectly to any and all online data sets that can be searched for.
If your protest group has some international funding, take the image to any of the big national private detective groups in the USA.
Their social media databases are long term, static, always updating and do not get altered like the online consumer networks.
They can rewind most accounts to creation and see ho