As the NY Times informs us tonight, compliments of journalist Charlie Savage, former U.S. State Department official John Napier Tye was "disillusioned"--much like former NSA/CIA/Booz Allen Hamilton contractor Edward Snowden was, in June 2013, as we're reminded in another illuminating piece by James Bamford in the latest issue of Wired magazine--with a speech made by President Obama, in January 2014, where he supposedly endorsed "changes to surveillance policies, including an end to the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of Americans’ domestic calling records."
(Since then, as many others have noted, including Savage in today's NYT, the White House is, effectively, seeking legal authority for further expansion of our country's surveillance state.)
The article continues in its opening paragraphs to inform readers that, like Tye, other folks in the Obama administration "had also considered a proposal to impose what an internal White House document, obtained by The New York Times, portrayed as 'significant changes' to rules for handling Americans’ data the N.S.A. collects from fiber-optic networks abroad. But Mr. Obama said nothing about that in his speech."
Less than four months ago, "as Mr. Tye was leaving the State Department, he filed a whistle-blower complaint arguing that the N.S.A.'s practices abroad violated Americans’ Fourth Amendment rights. He also met with staff members for the House and Senate intelligence committees. Last month, he went public with those concerns, which have attracted growing attention."
I'll pickup the formal story excerpt here, but I strongly encourage readers to take the time to peruse the entire article...
Reagan-Era Order on Surveillance Violates Rights, Says Departing Aide
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
NEW YORK TIMES
AUG. 14th, 2014
WASHINGTON–
...When operating abroad, the N.S.A. can gather and use Americans’ phone calls, emails, text messages and other communications under different — and sometimes more permissive — rules than when it collects them inside the United States. Much about those rules remains murky. The executive branch establishes them behind closed doors and can change them at will, with no involvement from Congress or the secret intelligence court that oversees surveillance on domestic networks.
“It’s a problem if one branch of government can collect and store most Americans’ communications, and write rules in secret on how to use them — all without oversight from Congress or any court, and without the consent or even the knowledge of the American people,” Mr. Tye said. “Regardless of the use rules in place today, this system could be abused in the future.”...
So, while Congress is
considering "amending the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which governs how the N.S.A. operates domestically"... "...the proposed changes would not touch the agency’s abilities overseas, which are authorized by Executive Order 12333, a Reagan-era presidential directive. The administration has declassified some rules for handling Americans’ messages gathered under the order, but the scope of that collection and other details about how the messages are used has remained unclear."
At this point in the introduction to his sweeping piece, Savage quotes American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) lawyer Jameel Jaffer: “The debate over the last year has barely touched on the executive order...It’s a black box.”
...The Times interviewed nearly a dozen current and former officials about 12333 rules for handling American communications, bringing further details to light. The rules are detailed in an accompanying chart.
By law, the N.S.A. cannot deliberately intercept an American’s messages without court permission. But it can “incidentally” collect such private communications as a consequence of its foreign surveillance.
The volume of incidental collection overseas is uncertain. Officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the delicate nature of the topic, said the N.S.A. had never studied the matter and most likely could not come up with a representative sampling. Mr. Tye called that “willful blindness.”
Still, the number of Americans swept up under 12333 could be sizable. As the N.S.A. intercepts content in bulk from satellite transmissions and from overseas fiber-optic hubs, Americans’ messages in the mix can be vacuumed up. By contrast, when operating on domestic networks under FISA, the agency may engage only in targeted, not dragnet, collection and storage of content.
Congress left the executive branch with a freer hand abroad because it was once rare for Americans’ communications to go overseas. But in the Internet era, that is no longer true…
In closing--and, as readers may note, much of "the lead" is buried in this piece, to say the least--we have these gems...
...the N.S.A. does not share raw 12333 intercepts with other agencies, like the F.B.I. or the C.I.A., to search for their own purposes. But the administration is drafting new internal guidelines that could permit such sharing, officials said...
The truth--contrary to tonight's
NY Times' piece--as topic expert, blogger, author, journalist and Netroots Nation seminar leader Marcy Wheeler has noted many times in the past few years, is that
the FBI is provided with virtual carte blanche when it comes to searching the raw content of domestic communications of Americans. And, there are few requirements in place at that agency when it comes to reporting same to the courts, as well.
And, then there's this, directly from tonight's article (as I've covered it many times in this community, please remember that references to "metadata" are, actually, "content")...
...The administration secretly changed the rules in November 2010 to allow the N.S.A. to analyze Americans’ metadata — information showing who communicates with whom, but not content — gathered under 12333, Mr. Snowden’s leaks showed. The agency may do so without outside permission and for any foreign intelligence purpose, not just counterterrorism.
That means there are fewer restrictions on the agency’s use of Americans’ bulk metadata when gathered abroad than when gathered on domestic soil under FISA and court oversight. The N.S.A.'s 12333 power would not diminish under the bill to replace the phone metadata program....
Here’s the link and an excerpt from the article’s must-read, accompanying graphics (and please understand, as even the article, linked above confirms it, what we're looking at--if you look closely at the graphics, linked below--is little more than a shell game, where one U.S. intelligence agency, or foreign counterpart, makes data it's captured available to others, in formats where other U.S. intelligence agencies and law enforcement entities may use it with very questionable legal and illegal "authority")…
Two Sets of Rules for Surveillance, Within U.S. and on Foreign Soil
NEW YORK TIMES
August 14th, 2014
The N.S.A. sometimes collects Americans’ private communications or data without individual warrants. When it does so from American soil, it is generally governed by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. When it does so from abroad, it is authorized by Executive Order 12333 with rules the executive branch decides for itself, some of which are secret. Based on interviews and documents, here’s how they compare…
# # #
As details are being further confirmed Wednesday night, for the umpteenth time—despite countless instances of cognitive dissonance and feeble attempts to discredit these inconvenient facts in response, even within this community--in Thursday’s New York Times, per the articles linked above, here’s just one of many instances, over the past two-plus years, where I’ve discussed facts regarding the Five Eyes’ domestic surveillance (from locations in Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) of U.S. citizens…
GCHQ's/NSA's Covert Online/Blog Infiltration Slideshow (and other inconvenient truths)
bobswern
Daily Kos
Tue Feb 25, 2014 at 02:29 AM EST
…while I understand that it's difficult for some in this country (and certainly within this blogging community) to acknowledge these latest, taxpayer-funded, Orwellian travesties for the inconvenient truths that they are, I wanted to point out the facts that:
1.) This latest story originated over at Great Britain's version of America's National Security Agency (NSA), known as Government Communications Headquarters (a/k/a "GCHQ"), but that shouldn't belie the greater reality that somewhere in the neighborhood of 2,000 NSA employees work there, across the pond.
2.) Virtually all of GCHQ, including the 2,000+/- NSA employees that work at that agency's offices in Great Britain, maintains direct access to virtually all NSA databases, including "PRISM," "Boundless Informant," and everything in-between.
3.) For at least a decade, it's been a widely-know fact in the intelligence community that all five nations participating in the Five Eyes program do each others' "dirty work." But, don't take my word for it, here's a column from Great Britain's Independent, from 2004 (and per my post here on December 27, 2013), to explain this...
How Britain and the US Keep Watch on the World
By Phillip Knightley
Independent (via Global Policy Forum)
February 27, 2004
From the National Security Agency’s imposing headquarters at Fort Meade, Maryland, ringed by a double-chain fence topped by barbed wire with strands of electrified wire between them, America “bugs” the world. Nothing politically or militarily significant, whether mentioned in a telephone call, in a conversation in the office of the secretary general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, or in a company fax or e-mail, escapes its attention.
Its computers – measured in acres occupied by them rather than simple figures – “vacuum the entire electromagnetic spectrum”, homing in on “key words” which may suggest something of interest to NSA customers is being conveyed. The NSA costs at least $3.5bn (£1.9bn) a year to run. It employs at least 20,000 officers (not counting the 100,000 servicemen and civilians around the world over whom it has control). Its shredders process 40 tons of paper a day.
Its junior partner is Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) at Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, the eavesdropping organisation for which Katharine Gun worked. Like NSA, GCHQ is a highly secret operation. Until 1983, when one of its officers, Geoffrey Prime, was charged with spying for the Russians, the Government had refused to reveal what GCHQ’s real role was, no doubt because its operations in peacetime were without a legal basis. Its security is maintained by massive and deliberately intimidating security. Newspapers have been discouraged from mentioning it; a book by a former GCHQ officer, Jock Kane, was seized by Special Branch police officers and a still photograph of its headquarters was banned by the Independent Broadcasting Authority, leaving a blank screen during a World in Action programme. As with NSA, the size of GCHQ’s staff at Cheltenham, about 6,500, gives no real indication of its strength. It has monitoring stations in Cyprus, West Germany, and Australia and smaller ones elsewhere. Much of its overseas work is done by service personnel. Its budget is thought to be more than £300m a year. A large part of this is funded by the United States in return for the right to run NSA listening stations in Britain – Chicksands, Bedfordshire; Edzell, Scotland; Mentworth Hill, Harrogate; Brawdy, Wales – and on British territory around the world.
The collaboration between the two agencies offers many advantages to both. Not only does it make monitoring the globe easier, it solves tricky legal problems and is the basis of the Prime Minister’s statement yesterday that all Britain’s bugging is lawful. The two agencies simply swap each other’s dirty work. GCHQ eavesdrops on calls made by American citizens and the NSA monitors calls made by British citizens, thus allowing each government plausibly to deny it has tapped its own citizens’ calls, as they do. The NSA station at Menwith Hill intercepts all international telephone calls made from Britain and GCHQ has a list of American citizens whose phone conversations interest the NSA…
(Bold type is diarist's emphasis.)
4.) Last, but definitely not least, I'd like to point out that there are somewhere in the neighborhood of many hundreds of thousands of communications, social media and public relations firms and individual consultants that will gladly "manage" your brand or personal reputation and/or promote it. Or, on the other hand, these same firms will trash competing brands or individuals (to accomplish same); and, in so doing, many of them will gladly infiltrate social media platforms throughout the world for a price. You may find many of these hundreds of thousands (if you do a Google search, you'll receive more than 43 million returns on the search) of services firms and individuals by clicking RIGHT HERE.
So, for someone to incorrectly posit that our own government, resplendent with a military-industrial-surveillance complex that we already know is spending somewhere in the neighborhood of $4.7 billion per year of taxpayer funds to trumpet their propaganda to the public (and frequently engages in doing so in a covert manner), is not doing what everyone else is doing is, simply, foolhardy, or in deep denial…
# # #
But, let's bring these new facts about foreign surveillance (on behalf of our government's domestic surveillance efforts) back home as we start to close out this post, and focus upon some recent news stories that have gone mostly unnoticed in this community over the past few days.
As we already know, on the homefront it's at our nation's 78 Fusion Centers where the NSA works in conjunction with the FBI, Department of Homeland Security and 15 other international and domestic U.S. intelligence and federal law enforcement organizations. These Fusion Centers also work directly with local law enforcement groups throughout the land. I've covered this story countless times in previous posts in this community, perhaps most extensively in a post here in March of this year: NYT (Breaking) Snowden Docs: "Raw Take," Rampant Sharing of Domestic, "Unminimized" Wiretap Content.
In that diary, it was widely noted how the NSA, DHS and other federally-sponsored groups spend a considerable amount of time helping U.S. law enforcement with domestic surveillance of Americans, with regard to "ordinary crimes." In fact, this massive, state surveillance infrastructure covers the full spectrum of "crimefighting": from Occupy Wall Street protestors, to environmental activists, to even assisting the Ferguson, Missouri police department as they destroy maintain "the peace" in their small city, this week. As Time Magazine has just noted it, in the name of "public safety," even the FAA may have provided propaganda cover...
FAA Implements No-Fly Zone in Ferguson Amid Unrest Over Killed Teen
Denver Nicks
Time Magazine
August 12, 2014
The Federal Aviation Administration issued a no-fly zone over Ferguson, Missouri, Tuesday at the request of the St. Louis County Police Department.
The St. Louis County Police Department told TIME it asked the FAA for the flight restriction after a police helicopter was fired upon “multiple times” during civil unrest Sunday. Ferguson, located just outside St. Louis, Missouri, erupted in street violence amid demonstrations sparked by the death of Michael Brown, a black teenager who was shot and killed by police on Saturday.
The FAA order restricts flights over the Ferguson area below 3,000 feet to first responders only, including medical and police helicopters. Private aircraft, including news helicopters, are prohibited from flying below 3,000 feet in a 3-mile radius around the town. The rule doesn’t apply to aircraft landing at or taking off from the nearby Lambert–St. Louis International Airport, a major commercial hub. The restriction is in place through August 18.
The order says the flight restrictions were put in place “to provide a safe environment for law enforcement activities.” The FAA would not elaborate further on the reason for the St. Louis County Police Department’s request. “If you want it, file a FOIA,” FAA Spokesperson Elizabeth Cory told TIME, in reference to a Freedom of Information Act request.
It’s not unusual for local police departments to request flight restrictions over potentially dangerous zones, and it’s typically done to clear airspace for police helicopter operations. The Ferguson restriction, however, may make it more difficult for news media to get aerial footage of the town as the Brown story continues to develop...
I'll let the Electronic Frontier Foundation explain other reasons why DHS-sponsored Fusion Centers "matter," especially when it comes to our government maintaining "control"...
Why Fusion Centers Matter: FAQ
By Nadia Kayyali
Electronic Frontier Foundation
April 7, 2014
While NSA surveillance has been front and center in the news recently, fusion centers are a part of the surveillance state that deserve close scrutiny.
Fusion centers are a local arm of the so-called "intelligence community," the 17 intelligence agencies coordinated by the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC). The government documentation around fusion centers is entirely focused on breaking down barriers between the various government agencies that collect and maintain criminal intelligence information.
Barriers between local law enforcement and the NSA are already weak. We know that the Drug Enforcement Agency gets intelligence tips from the NSA which are used in criminal investigations and prosecutions. To make matters worse, the source of these tips is camouflaged using “parallel construction,” meaning that a different source for the intelligence is created to mask its classified source.
This story demonstrates what we called “one of the biggest dangers of the surveillance state: the unquenchable thirst for access to the NSA's trove of information by other law enforcement agencies.” This is particularly concerning when NSA information is used domestically. Fusion centers are no different.
In fact, in early 2012, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court approved the sharing of raw NSA data with the NCTC. The intelligence community overseen by the NCTC includes the Department of Homeland Security and FBI, the main federal fusion center partners. Thus, fusion centers—and even local law enforcement—could potentially be receiving unminimized NSA data. This runs counter to the distant image many people have of the NSA, and it's why focusing on fusion centers as part of the recently invigorated conversation around surveillance is important…
# # #
Of course, as we were also reminded over these past couple of days, another way our government maintains "control" is via taxpayer-funded propaganda. (Many, even at Daily Kos, claim this would never happen in our "democracy.") Here are links to a couple examples of that, and this is just since Tuesday:
Is Former NSA Contractor Snowden a Traitor? Andre de Nesnera, Voice of America, August 13th, 2013
NPR Is Laundering CIA Talking Points to Make You Scared of NSA Reporting, Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman, The Intercept, August 12th, 2014
Whether it's Ferguson, Missouri or halfway around the globe, the truth on this over-arching story just can't be "contained."
# # #