tagged w/ NSA
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God forbid you were born prior to 1950 and/or your birth certificate was improperly filed or maybe the original copy that is embossed got lost in a house fire or a NUMBER of different reasons, you now are not ALLOWED to leave the country? THIS is America? EXCUSE me? I'm pretty sure my own original birth certificate DOES meet these requirements, but I think the original was lovingly taped to a page of my baby book by mom which is somewhere in my parents' home. I'm sure it's in a special fire safe or something since my parents are so organized. So whenever it is that I decide to get another passport I guess I have to go bug my parents, carry a really big baby book to some government office, and I hope I can pass as "American enough" to go on vacation? Even to Canada? Really?
Yet I guess it's no big deal if people are allowed to buy up all sorts of military assault rifles without any proof of mental sanity or criminal background check. That's cute. I know I was born into a country with a lot of really nice rights and freedoms. I was brainwashed by the powers that be in this country that a flag is holier than a Bible or a Constitution and that soldiers who are forced to go kill innocent brown people on other continents are "protecting my freedoms" and other such propaganda. Now that I'm 30 I've lost more and more of my rights. I don't have anymore rights to privacy, that's for sure. I don't have the right to get on an airplane without some pervert TSA agent either feeling up all my private parts or taking a naked x-ray scan of me, if I ever were to get an abortion I might be forced to do so within a couple of months and wait several days and hear my doctor read some stupid script and have a medically un-necessary ultrasound and prove I wasn't raped, I will never get the right to have Medicare when I am old let alone Social Security which I've been forced to pay into while working, the banks all got bailed out with TARP funds yet I still don't have the right to access my OWN money I earn and pay taxes on from an ATM machine without paying a $3 (and soon $5) fee because I guess the banks are big greedy babies who want it ALL, I don't have the right to clean air and water because our world leaders can't stop drilling for oil and spilling the crap all over the place, I don't have the right to my own cell phone if a cop decides to stop me for some arbitrary reason and demands I turn over the phone so they can remove the SIM card and steal all my PERSONAL phone information (not making that one up), and if certain GOP candidates God forbid win the 2012 presidency, children won't have the right to wear sagging pants (and probably not plumbers either as they'd be guilty of the same crime) but heroin MIGHT become legal. Yes, HEROIN, not pot. (Meaning the drug that kills people, not the one that makes you hungry for Cheetos.)
I am confused. WHAT country do I live in now? One with rights? Or a Capitalistic fascist one? I'm a little confused about what I was taught as a little kid when the school I went to insisted we recite the Pledge of Allegiance in addition to all the propaganda I got from the textbooks (ALL Texas based publishing company since schools never get to decide textbooks) which were completely focused on white men and wars and nothing else. War war war and more war and guns guns guns and bombs. What happened to the days of John Lennon and Peace and Love? Really, what has happened to my country? All because a really smart Harvard graduate black man got elected and a bunch of KKK Teabagging idiots can't stand that thought? The Tea Party wants us broke, stupid, trapped, with guns to our heads. That's the message I'm getting lately.
http://travel.state.gov/passport/passport_5401.html
New U.S. Birth Certificate Requirement
Beginning April 1, 2011, the U.S. Department of State will require the full names of the applicant’s parent(s) to be listed on all certified birth certificates to be considered as primary evidence of U.S. citizenship for all passport applicants, regardless of age. Certified birth certificates missing this information will not be acceptable as evidence of citizenship. This will not affect applications already in-process that have been submitted or accepted before the effective date.
For more information, see 22 CFR 51.42(a).
To obtain a new birth certificate, see the CDC.
In addition to this requirement, certified copies of birth certificates must also include the following information to be considered acceptable primary evidence of U.S. citizenship:
* Full name of the applicant
* Date of birth
* Place of birth
* Raised, embossed, impressed or multicolored seal of issuing authority
* Registrar’s signature
* The date the certificate was filed with the registrar’s office (must be within one year)
If you cannot obtain a birth certificate that meets these requirements, please see Secondary Evidence of U.S. Citizenship.God forbid you were born prior to 1950 and/or your birth certificate was improperly... more
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The NSA has recently released several files in accordance with a recent FOIA request, among them was a document stating we have received messages from space aliens.The NSA has recently released several files in accordance with a recent FOIA request,... more
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First French UFO files, then the British UFO files, the FBI Vault and recently the Kennedy disclosure. And now files from the prominent security agency, the NSA, saying they have received alien messages,could the enlightenment period that the Mayans said would happen in 2012 actual be the revelation that we have visitors.
http://www.ufo-blogger.com/2011/04/nsa-alien-messages-received.htmlFirst French UFO files, then the British UFO files, the FBI Vault and recently the... more
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Cairo, Egypt, 4th February 2011:
The violent assaults on TV journalists in Egypt are forcing some to pull out of the country. Many have been harassed, punched and some nearly killed.
TV2's Rasmus Tantholdt Yesterday one of the worst attacks took place against TV2 Denmark’s correspondent Rasmus Tantholdt and cameraman, Anders Bach.
TV2’s managing editor, Hans Peter Blicher, told TVZ what happened: “They were coming by car from the south to Alexandria. There was a huge crowd of people who stopped their car who had the feeling they were reporters. The people were very angry and started banging on the car with sticks and knives and broke the windows, trying to pull our correspondent out of the car by his hair. He shouted to the driver, ‘Drive! Drive!’ “
“The driver started the car and some of the crowd were thrown off and it became a very violent situation. But what happened next was the worst thing because 100 metres ahead was a road block and the crowd became even more angry attacking the car with everything and totally destroyed it. The crew were in no doubt for a second that they were going to be killed. But then three military people came and began shooting in the air to clear the crowd. They then escorted our people to a hotel.”
Hans Peter added, “This is our correspondent who has been to places like Afghanistan, Iraq – he is very experienced. He said this was the worst thing he had ever experienced. He was sure they were going to be killed.”
The crew are now back home.
They were not the only TV2 journalists to be attacked. Correspondent Steffen Jensen was set upon yesterday by pro-Mubarak supporters with clubs while reporting live on the phone from Cairo. He said, "I refused to give my phone and my passport to them and some of them grabbed my camera and my backpack and started giving me beatings with fists and clubs."
RTSI's Gianluca Grossi Another journalist who left Egypt yesterday is Gianluca Grossi, a journalist working for RTSI in Switzerland. He flew out of the country last night after being stopped by a crowd while in a taxi. He told TVZ, “I was harassed by a group of people who were apparently supporting the pro-Mubarak camp. Only the arrival of the army allowed me to continue safely. The army officer told me to hide my bag [containing TV gear] with a blanket because if they find out you’re a journalist, they’ll kill you.”
He said, “I think in Cairo there is a group of people who are hunting journalists. I consider the danger very high because of this. There is no safe place to go; even the hotels are not safe. I saw one Greek journalist coming back to the hotel with a big wound to his head. I saw another middle-aged, blonde, European journalist being taken away by people from the pro-Mubarak camp. I don’t know what happened to him. There is no police to turn to.”
Gianluca added, “I always follow my instinct and this time my instinct told me I had to leave. I spoke this morning with a Western diplomatic source and they told me that many journalists are on their way to the airport. Many times you have a problem as a journalist in a conflict area but you don’t feel the people want you out; in Cairo you feel they want you out.”
TRT journalist Metin Puran was also the victim of an attack yesterday. TRT’s Foreign Newsdesk editor, Burcu Altinyeleklioglu, told TVZ Metin was punched by a group of people he thought to be pro-Mubarak supporters. He was rescued by an army officer but only after the crowd “took his cellphones and camera, his wallet, his IDs, his money, everything.”
Burcu added, “He was shocked and frightened but he was on air just after the incident. He himself became the news.”
GO TO STORY"
http://www.tvz.tv/?c=messages&s=more&id=4216Cairo, Egypt, 4th February 2011:
The violent assaults on TV journalists in... more
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The US Air Force launched a massive spy satellite yesterday for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). For obvious reasons, the NRO is cagey about what exactly it's shot into space.
But the satellite is believed to be the largest in the world, and to be aimed at intercepting communications via a vast array of radio receivers and an enormous antenna.
"I believe the payload is the fifth in the series of what we call Mentor spacecraft, a.k.a. Advanced Orion," satellite tracker Ted Molczan told Spaceflight Now.
"The satellite likely consists of sensitive radio receivers and an antenna generally believed to span up to 328 feet to gather electronic intelligence for the National Security Agency," TG Daily reports.
It is believed it will help the U.S.'s eavesdropping abilities. The rocket is 235ft tall and can launch payloads of up to 24 tons into low Earth orbit.
The Delta 4-Heavy is America's most powerful liquid-fuelled rocket and generated 2,000,000lb of thrust at take-off. It has been in use since 2004, Daily Mail reports.The US Air Force launched a massive spy satellite yesterday for the National... more
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Over 150 people attended a community meeting at Walker Church Friday night, most on less than six hours notice, to begin to respond to Friday morning's FBI raids and subpoenas to local antiwar and international solidarity organizers. (See video of the meeting at right.) At the church, activists confirmed that five homes and the Anti-War Committee's office were raided.
Organizers also announced two upcoming events: a protest outside the Minneapolis FBI office, 111 Washington Ave. S., at 4:30pm on Monday; and a solidarity committee meeting on Thursday at 7pm, location to be determined. The subpoenas ask activists to appear before a grand jury in Chicago, where a solidarity vigil was held last night as a raid was still ongoing in that city, on or around October 19, reported a Chicago Indymedia post.
Those following international news on Friday noticed an eerie coincidence--or perhaps not. On Thursday, the Colombian military assassinated the #2 leader of the guerrilla group Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia, or FARC. On Friday, President Obama met at the U.N. General Assembly to schmooze with incoming Colombian President Juan Manual Santos, leading to clear suspicion of U.S. involvement in the assassination. FARC is among the resistance groups termed "foreign terrorist organizations" by the U.S. and is listed in the warrant for Mick Kelly's residence. Another bit of interesting timing: just earlier this week, the FBI's Inspector General criticized the FBI for lying to the Justice Department about raids and surveillence of peace groups after 9/11.Over 150 people attended a community meeting at Walker Church Friday night, most on... more
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As WikiLeaks prepares a new dump of secret war documents, the feds’ intel SWAT team races to do damage control. Philip Shenon reports on its leader and its inner workings.
In a nondescript suite of government offices not far from the Pentagon, nearly 120 intelligence analysts, FBI agents, and others are at work—24 hours a day, seven days a week—on the frontlines of the government’s secret war against WikiLeaks.
Dubbed the WikiLeaks War Room by some of its occupants, the round-the-clock operation is on high alert this month as WikiLeaks and its elusive leader, Julian Assange, threaten to release a second batch of thousands of classified American war logs from Afghanstan. Thousands more leaked documents from another American war zone—Iraq—are also reportedly slated for release by WikiLeaks this fall.
“I do not have time to correct all the lies and distortions that are issued each day by the tabloid press and others who should know better,” Assange said in an email.
Although outsiders have not been allowed to inspect the “war room” in suburban Virginia and see its staff at work, national-security officials offered details of the operation to The Daily Beast, including the identity of the counterintelligence expert who has been put in charge: Brig. General Robert A. Carr of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Officials say Carr, handpicked for the assignment by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, is highly respected among his colleagues at DIA, the Pentagon’s equivalent of the CIA, and a fitting adversary to Assange, the nomadic Australian-born computer hacker who founded WikiLeaks and is now believed to be in Sweden.
“I wouldn’t want to go up against General Carr,” a Pentagon official said. “Very smart guy.” Carr served in Afghanistan for much of last year before his transfer to the DIA in Washington, where he runs the Defense Counterintelligence and Human Intelligence Center. In his battle against Assange, officials say, Carr’s central assignment is to try to determine exactly what classified information might have been leaked to WikiLeaks, and then to predict whether its disclosure could endanger American troops in the battlefield, as well as what larger risk it might pose to American foreign policy.
FOLLOW THE LINK... To Read the Rest!As WikiLeaks prepares a new dump of secret war documents, the feds’ intel SWAT... more
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As more evidence comes to light of corporate profiteering from rendition, arguments about 'national security' look ever shabbier
In a backwards move, the ninth circuit court of appeals in San Francisco dismissed on Wednesday a lawsuit brought against Boeing subsidiary Jeppesen Dataplan for its facilitation of CIA torture flights – reversing an earlier decision(http://mobile.latimes.com/wap/news/text.jsp?sid=294&nid=21214417&cid=16677&scid=1854&ith=2&title=Top+Stories). This means that the longest surviving "accountability" case in the US courts has now been blocked – like all the others – on the all-too-familiar "grounds of national security". While a review by the supreme court is still possible, the chances are beyond slim.
In his decision, Judge Raymond Fisher described the case(http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/sep/09/us-court-binyam-mohamed-torture) as "a painful conflict between human rights and national security". In the UK, we have seen some politicians conflate "national security" with "national embarrassment" – seeking to keep information secret not because its disclosure would create a risk to the nation, but rather because states do not want the details of their illegal activities revealed. Thankfully, British courts have proved relatively effective at policing this.
Sadly, US courts have proved less robust, adopting the executive position wholesale and shying away from any judicial oversight on the US-led "war on terror". Corporate complicity in US government-sponsored torture remains a largely untold chapter of the "war on terror". As well as Jeppesen Dataplan, other private companies have profited from the US government's "extraordinary rendition" programme, which has resulted in documented cases of detainees being tortured. But none of these companies has yet been brought to court to account for their lucrative part in the system.
A series of legal cases – such as the class action suit brought by Vision Air(http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/jan/10/charter-airlines-suit-over-war-zone-hazard-pay-get/) employees who allege that the company withheld thousands of dollars' worth of "hazard pay" for making flights that, it has been alleged, may have included renditions(http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/question-marks-hang-over-spy-purveyor-vision-airlines/19548529); and the Kyle "Dusty" Foggo affair(http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/f/kyle_foggo/index.html), where a CIA officer was convicted of bribery in relation to the awarding of CIA "secret prison" contracts – shines new light into the murky business of what might be called public-private partnership in the CIA secret prison and rendition system.
As the Bush administration's system of illegal detention and torture is uncovered in European courts, it seems clear that justice may take longer to be done in the US. No doubt, the imminent official UK inquiry into torture will examine the issue of private "torture profiteering", and a raft of cases will soon be filed against companies in various European jurisdictions. We have to hope that, as the evidence comes forward, US courts will take a different view of what constitutes genuine national security interests – as opposed to political expediency and government face-saving – when it comes to suits brought by actual human victims of torture.As more evidence comes to light of corporate profiteering from rendition, arguments... more
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Julian Assange Gets The Bog Standard Smear Technique
The Russians call it Kompromat - the use by the state of sexual accusations to destroy a public figure. When I was attacked in this way by the government I worked for, Uzbek dissidents smiled at me, shook their heads and said "Kompromat". They were used to it from the Soviet and Uzbek governments. They found it rather amusing to find that Western governments did it too.
Bizarrely the offence for which Julian is wanted for questioning in Sweden was dropped from rape to sexual harassment, and then from sexual harassment to just harassment.
So from rape to non-sexual something. Actually I rather like that law - if we had it here, I could have had Jack Straw locked up for a year.
Julian tells us that the first woman accuser and prime mover had worked in the Swedish Embassy in Washington DC and had been expelled from Cuba for anti-Cuban government activity, as well as the rather different persona of being a feminist lesbian who owns lesbian night clubs.Julian Assange Gets The Bog Standard Smear Technique
The Russians call it Kompromat... more
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Cases brought against journalists who ferreted out confidential information appear to have little to do with protecting national security interests.
It is a popular conservative myth to suggest that the "mainstream media" is a liberal lapdog to the Obama administration, that reporters favor the president and that he returns the admiration. In fact, this administration has pursued a quiet but malicious campaign against the news media and their sources, more aggressively attacking those who ferret out confidential information than even the George W. Bush administration did.
James Risen of the New York Times has been ordered to testify about sources for his 2006 book, "State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration." (Risen, a former Los Angeles Times reporter, is fighting that subpoena.) A former National Security Agency official has been indicted for allegedly supplying material to the Baltimore Sun, and for obstructing justice when he allegedly destroyed information related to those contacts. A former FBI official was prosecuted for leaking to a blogger. And now, the administration is accusing the WikiLeaks website of causing vague harm to American interests and operatives by posting classified material.
It is understandable that the administration has secrets and wants to keep them. But this campaign to flush out sources has the feel of chest-thumping and intimidation. It is one thing to protect information that might put Americans in danger or undermine national security; it is another to bring cases against whistle-blowers and others who divulge information to spur debate and raise questions about public policy.
Take the case of Thomas Drake, the former NSA official who is accused of leaking to the Baltimore Sun. The paper reported extensively on technical problems with an NSA program that Drake was involved with; that reporting embarrassed the government, which indicted the individual it says brought about that embarrassment. That smacks of retaliation, not legitimate protection of sensitive information. Similarly, Risen's book is now four years old and details the problems of a bygone presidential administration. What purpose is served by prolonging the case against him? As for WikiLeaks, its disclosures contained little analysis of war policy but illuminated many of the challenges of the United States' long war in Afghanistan, fueling a debate that the administration may not want but that is urgently in the nation's interest to have.
"Our national security demands that the sort of conduct alleged here — violating the government's trust by illegally retaining and disclosing classified information — be prosecuted and prosecuted vigorously," the Justice Department stated when announcing the indictment of Drake. Fair enough, but the duties of a democratic government include embracing conflict and debate. Stifling information violates that trust far more profoundly than does whistle-blowing or shedding light on a war.Cases brought against journalists who ferreted out confidential information appear to... more
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Program Helps Law Enforcement Determine Who Is Most Likely to Commit Crime
In the movie Minority Report set in the year 2054, an experimental Washington, D.C. police force called Precrime has completely neutralized murder in the city. Reality is scarier – new crime prediction software being rolled out in the nation’s capital that George Orwell’s Thought Police might have found useful: an artificial intelligence system designed to gain insight into what people are thinking.
Developed by Richard Berk, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, the software is already used in Baltimore and Philadelphia to predict which individuals on probation or parole are most likely to murder and to be murdered.
In his latest version, the one being implemented in D.C., Berk goes even further, identifying the individuals most likely to commit crimes other than murder.
Predicting future crimes does sound, well, futuristic, said Berk. Even his students at the University of Pennsylvania compare his research to the Tom Cruise movie “Minority Report.”
Scientifically, Berk’s results are “very impressive,” said Shawn Bushway, a professor of criminal justice at the State University of New York at Albany who is familiar with Berk’s research.
Predicting rare events like murder, even among high-risk individuals, is extremely difficult, said Bushway, and Berk is doing a better job of it than anyone else.........
READ ENTIRE ARTICLE: http://morichesdaily.com/2010/08/thought-police-software-predicts-criminal-behavior/Program Helps Law Enforcement Determine Who Is Most Likely to Commit Crime
In the... more
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It is said no other nation on earth has a more powerful military apparatus than the United States. We spend $700B on defense annually---more than the rest of the world combined. Are we really that scared?
Are we that reviled? You’ve got to ask, if so, why?It is said no other nation on earth has a more powerful military apparatus than the... more
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False Flag Cyber Attack Could Takedown The Internet
Billion dollar cybersecurity industry at the forefront of ‘Top Secret America’ complex
Steve Watson
Prisonplanet.com
Wednesday, Jul 21st, 2010
An increasing clamour to restrict and control the internet on behalf of the government, the Pentagon, the intelligence community and their private corporate arms, could result in a staged cyber attack being used as justification.
Over recent months we have seen a great increase in media coverage of inflated fears over a possible “electronic Pearl Harbor” event, with reports claiming that the U.S. could be “felled within 15 minutes”.
(VIDEO WARNING) Cyber Security Emergency: False Flag Government Cyber Attack Could Takedown The Internet…http://ctpatriot1970.wordpress.com/2010/07/21/video-warning-cyber-security-emergency-false-flag-government-cyber-attack-could-takedown-the-internet/
Vastly over-hyped (and in some cases completely asinine) claims that the power grids and other key infrastructure such as rail networks and water sources are wired up to the public internet have permeated such coverage.False Flag Cyber Attack Could Takedown The Internet
Billion dollar cybersecurity... more
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An increasing clamour to restrict and control the internet on behalf of the government, the Pentagon, the intelligence community and their private corporate arms, could result in a staged cyber attack being used as justification.
Over recent months we have seen a great increase in media coverage of inflated fears over a possible “electronic Pearl Harbor” event, with reports claiming that the U.S. could be “felled within 15 minutes”.
Vastly over-hyped (and in some cases completely asinine) claims that the power grids and other key infrastructure such as rail networks and water sources are wired up to the public internet have permeated such coverage.
Threats against computer networks in the United States are grossly exaggerated. Dire reports issued by the Defense Science Board and the Center for Strategic and International Studies “are usually richer in vivid metaphor — with fears of ‘digital Pearl Harbors’ and ‘cyber-Katrinas’ — than in factual foundation,” writes Evgeny Morozov, a respected researcher and blogger who writes on the political effects of the internet.
Morozov notes that much of the data on the supposed cyber threat “are gathered by ultra-secretive government agencies — which need to justify their own existence — and cyber-security companies — which derive commercial benefits from popular anxiety.”
When the Cybersecurity Act was introduced by Senator John Rockefeller last year, he made similar claims about the threat of cyber attacks, adding “Would it have been better if we’d have never invented the Internet?”.
Rockefeller’s legislation gives the president the ability to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any “critical” information network “in the interest of national security.” The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president, according to a Mother Jones report.
Provisions in the bill would allow the federal government, via the DHS and the NSA, to tap into any digital aspect of every citizen’s information without a warrant. Banking, business and medical records would be wide open to inspection, as well as personal instant message and e mail communications – all in the name of heading off cyber attacks on the nation.
Enhancements of such provisions are contained in the more recent “Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act”, which is being pushed hard by Senator Joe Lieberman. The bill would hand absolute power to the federal government to close down networks, and block incoming Internet traffic from certain countries under a declared national emergency.
An accompanying cybersecurity control grid would only create greater risk according to experts who note that it would essentially “establish a path for the bad guys to skip down.” Other countries, such as Australia and the UK are following suit.
The program dovetails with the Pentagon’s newly created Cyber Command, headed by Keith B Alexander, the acting head of the NSA and the man behind the massive program of illegal dragnet surveillance of domestic communications since at least 2001.
During the Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing, Alexander said the Pentagon’s Cyber Command would enjoy “significant synergy” with the NSA. “We have to show what we’re doing to ensure that we comport, comply with the laws,” said Alexander, perversely claiming the agency is respecting and protecting the privacy of the American people.
The Pentagon considers cyberspace a warfighting domain equal to land, sea, air and space. In 2003, the Pentagon classified the internet as an enemy “weapons system” requiring a “robust offensive suite of capabilities to include full-range electronic and computer network attack.” It has spent Billions of dollars building a super secret “National Cyber Range” in order to prepare for “Dominant Cyber Offensive Engagement”, which translates as control over “any and all” computers. The program has been dubbed “The Electronic Manhattan Project”.
The enemy is never specifically named, it is merely whoever uses the net, because the enemy IS the net. The enemy is the freedom the net provides to billions around the globe and the threat to militaristic dominance of information and the ultimate power that affords.
These initiatives represent a continuation of the so called “Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative”, created via a secret presidential order in 2008 under the Bush administration. former National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell announced that the NSA’s warrantless wiretaps would “be a walk in the park compared to this,”.
“This is going to be a goat rope on the Hill” McConnell said. My prediction is that we’re going to screw around with this until something horrendous happens.”
As we have previously reported, large corporations such as Google, AT&T, Facebook and Yahoo to name but a few are intimately involved in the overarching program. Those corporations have specific government arms that are supplying the software, hardware and tech support to US intelligence agencies in the process of creating a vast closed source database for global spy networks to share information.
Clearly the implications of this program for the open and free internet, and for liberty in general are very worrying, this has been reflected in the resistance and criticism from groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
In light of this, there is a real danger of a hyped or completely staged cyber attack being propagated in order to bring the issue to public attention and counter the critics who have exposed it as a part of the agenda to restrict the Internet.
In 2008 Stanford Law professor Lawrence Lessig detailed such ongoing government plans for overhaul and restriction.
Clearly the implications of this program for the open and free internet, and for liberty in general are very worrying, this has been reflected in the resistance and criticism from groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
In light of this, there is a real danger of a hyped or completely staged cyber attack being propagated in order to bring the issue to public attention and counter the critics who have exposed it as a part of the agenda to restrict the Internet.
In 2008 Stanford Law professor Lawrence Lessig detailed such ongoing government plans for overhaul and restriction.
Lessig told attendees of a high profile Tech conference that “There’s going to be an i-9/11 event” which will act as a catalyst for a radical reworking of the law pertaining to the internet.
Lessig said that he came to that conclusion following a conversation with former government Counter Terrorism Czar Richard Clarke, who informed him that there is already in existence a cyber equivalent of the Patriot Act, an “i-Patriot Act” if you will, and that the Justice Department is just waiting for a cyber terrorism event in order to implement its provisions.
Lessig is the founder of Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society. He is founding board member of Creative Commons and is a board member of the Software Freedom Law Center. He is best known as a proponent of reduced legal restrictions on copyright, trademark and radio frequency spectrum, particularly in technology applications.
These are clearly not the ravings of some paranoid cyber geek.
Though Richard Clarke advocates an enhancement of cyber security, even he has stated that it would be a terrible idea to allow the government to regulate and filter the internet.An increasing clamour to restrict and control the internet on behalf of the... more
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A former NSA executive who is fighting government charges of leaking classified information was part of a group that pursued several sanctioned paths to report concerns about an agency spy program, but was repeatedly frustrated by the government’s inaction, according to a report Wednesday.
Thomas Drake, now reduced to working at a Washington, D.C.-area Apple store while awaiting his trial, first notified his superiors at the National Security Agency, then looked to Congress to address his concerns, and finally worked with a group that went to the Defense Department’s inspector general, according to The Washington Post. When all of these avenues failed to net results, he took his information to a reporter at The Baltimore Sun.
Drake now faces a maximum sentence of 35 years in prison if convicted of mishandling classified information and obstructing justice.
Drake’s information involved a data-mining program called ThinThread that, after the Sept. 11 attacks, was going to be replaced by a more expensive, less efficient and less privacy-friendly program called Trailblazer. When he expressed concerns that the new program would ignore constitutional safeguards around wiretapping, he was reportedly rebuffed by his superiors.
“He tried to have his concerns heard and nobody really wanted to listen,” attorney Nina Ginsberg, who is representing a former Capitol Hill staffer but is not representing Drake, told the Post.
Drake began working for the NSA in 1989 as a contractor. His job was to evaluate software programs for the agency. In 2001, on the morning of Sept. 11 to be exact, he began a new job as a senior executive at the NSA overseeing the office of change leadership and communications, the Post says. ThinThread was developed for the NSA in the ’90s to mine massive amounts of digital data collected by the agency and find patterns.
One of the existing program’s key features was a privacy component that anonymized collected data through encryption. The identifying information would only be decrypted if authorities gained sufficient evidence to obtain a warrant. Although the mere collection of domestic data was still illegal without a warrant, Drake apparently approved of the product as long as the anonymization feature was in place.
But after Sept. 11, NSA director Michael Hayden opted instead for the $1.2 billion Trailblazer program, which was believed to have more robust capability to handle larger volumes of data, but which had none of the privacy safeguards present in ThinThread.
Three of Drake’s superiors now say that he never mentioned his concerns about constitutional safeguards to them, but career NSA employees back Drake’s story, according to the paper. They took their concerns to congressional leaders and staffers, including Diane Roark, a Republican staff member of the House Intelligence Committee. Roark contacted Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who was responsible for appointing judges to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court — the court that oversees requests for national security surveillance warrants. But Rehnquist apparently was a dead end.
Roark also had no luck with her boss, House Intelligence Chairman Porter Goss (R-Florida). Instead of performing his congressional oversight duty, Goss simply sent her along to NSA chief Hayden, who told her: “We’re proud of what we’re doing and how we’re doing it.”
That’s when Roark and former NSA employees who sided with Drake took their concerns to the Defense Department’s inspector general. They reported that the NSA had shelved ThinThread in favor of a program that cost 10 times as much and was less effective.
An administrative investigation was spawned by their complaint, as well as two criminal fraud investigations. The inspector general’s report was completed in December 2004 but was classified and led to no action.
It was Roark who suggested Drake contact a reporter at that point. A month later, in December 2005, The New York Times reported its groundbreaking story disclosing that the NSA had been spying on Americans, based on information from anonymous sources. Drake decided he should come forward with his information as well.
He contacted Siobhan Gorman at The Baltimore Sun, using Hushmail, an encrypted e-mail service. They communicated for a year without Drake identifying himself, before they finally met in person.
Drake allegedly provided Gorman with scans of classified documents, from which she wrote an article questioning the NSA’s replacement of ThinThread with Trailblazer and its abandonment of privacy safeguards. Drake later told New Yorker investigative reporter Seymour Hersh that the story was actually much more significant than what The Baltimore Sun reported.
Drake’s attorney, a public defender, says the government’s allegations against his client are factually wrong and miss important principles suggested by the case.
“Throughout, Tom Drake has tried as best he could to do the right thing in service of his country,” Jim Wyda told the Post. “His motives in this important matter are completely pure.”A former NSA executive who is fighting government charges of leaking classified... more
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The secret $100 Million Raytheon developed clandestine surveillance program for the NSA watches big companies and keeps tem safe from digital attacks, according to the Wall Street Journal.The secret $100 Million Raytheon developed clandestine surveillance program for the... more
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