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Looks like the NSA is getting into some new snooping business:
In a major shift, the National Security Agency is drawing up plans for a new domestic assignment: helping protect government and private communications networks from cyberattacks and infiltration by terrorists and hackers, according to current and former intelligence officials.
As Marcy says, it looks like the NSA -- which has much broader powers -- is taking over much of the Department of Homeland Security's duties. Up until now they've only guarded the government's classified networks, and may have to change their charter to do this. There are a whole host of privacy concerns which arise with what's being proposed:
"This will create a major uproar," predicted Ira Winkler, a former NSA analyst who is now a cybersecurity consultant."If you're going to do cybersecurity, you have to spy on Americans to secure Americans," said a former government official familiar with NSA operations. "It would be a very major step."
A former senior NSA official said the difference between monitoring networks in order to defend them and monitoring them to collect intelligence is very small.
The former officials spoke on condition of anonymity to protect relationships with intelligence agencies.
I'm sure the NSA is exempt from the politicization that every other department in the federal government has been subject to under the Bush administration, and that when they call anti-war activists terrorist sympathizers and traitors they are only kidding.
But if that wasn't enough to ease your privacy worries, this should be:
Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell, a former NSA chief, is coordinating the initiative.
I know I'm relieved.
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Jane!
I told the folks downstairs.
I read this earlier today, and still have chills.
Interesting post. I wonder why having NSA involved does not give me that warm fuzzy feeling?
hi jane!
Oh. My. God.
Well, now you’ll have all the hackers and geeks arrayed against that. Talk about a sleeping giant.
The proposal is so laughable on its face, it’s ridiculous. The only reason to do this is is to eavesdrop. This isn’t some small step twix one and the other. The former is window dressing for the actual intention.
all TIA, alla time
Just read that one before you posted it. Creepy, eh?
The other one of the day was the WaPo’s article on the growing Big Brotherhood.
I’m imagining that they all worked over time as we were leaving Chicago after YKos.
peanutbutter @ 6
Like NSA isn’t already. What this does give them some legal cover.
Scientists Use the “Dark Web” to Snag Extremists and Terrorists Online
This could be fun!
Anybody remember a few weeks back when Skype’s online phone service went dead for a couple days - ostensibly because too many Windows Vista users rebooted at the same time?
I’m bettin’ they were “cooperating” at the point of a figurative gun.
Jane… Thank you for the info on the book “The Cure”. Just picked it up and looking forward to reading it.
Just thanks ..
Been having trouble with my Verizon e-mail now and again. And haven’t gotten ANYTHING from MoveOn in a couple of weeks—not even a confirmation of the $$ I sent them a couple of days ago.
Not that I’m paranoid, but . . . .
Which Internet Concern Worries You The Most?
Oh, and Jane, LOVE the comic above.
I remember them well.
Laura Doty @ 3
Brrrrrrrazil
Brought to us by the people who knew how to save villages.
By destroying them.
Wonder which of Mike’s telecomm board buddies will have his ear on how to rig the ‘net for Big Telcomms.
Oh - silly me.
All of ‘em.
Power exists to serve the megacorps - it would never be so crass as to favor one patron over another.
RevDeb @ 13
Uh, they can and do “filter” email. Cable guys, too.
Why don’t they just install movie cameras in all of our bedrooms and be done with it?
Lahoma just said to me, after reading a comment I wrote on another blog; “kiddo you’re nothing less than a rabid radical”. Sent chills up my spine. God I love this woman.
The funny thing is that they are going to have these mountains of data the size of multiple Everest’s and still unable to find that ONE clue that will save the world…..
But they will have all the data to cow anyone with that tiny secret we all have that might hurt our loved ones.
Wiki’s (pithy) def. of facism:
I’m changing my language. From now on, I will be saying not ‘this administration,’ but this FASCIST administration. And not Republicans (unless I’m speaking of (sigh) Lowell Weiker) but the Authoritarians…
{{{{{katymine}}}}}
thoughts are with you…
one by one, our freedom and privacy are being taken away by government, ostensibly to protect us
and it’s being accomplished because Americans are too comfortable in their materialism and too complacent
a republic if you can keep it, indeed
From the article and the dept of you can’t make this stuff up:
katymine @ 21
It’s not about tracking the terra ists, it’s about tracking the dems and dirty tricks . . . and finding more ways to steal us blind.
Tin foil hat—they have no intention of giving up power in 2008-9.
katymine @ 12
Good luck, katymine. Saw your comment the other night. Hope you are okay.
Eureka Springs @ 25
Yeah you can’t make this stuff up.
thinking about you, katymine
peanutbutter @ 14
Let’s all make sure we vote in that “Which Internet Concern Worries You The Most?” poll!
And hint…hint…you might want to vote for this one:
“Government spying on phone and Internet.”
and not this one:
“Absolutely nothing. The internet is great!”
{{{{{{{{katymine}}}}}}}
Eureka Springs @ 25
Resistance is futile!
Comverse Insofy and Amdocs are two Israeli based private communications companies that have come under question.
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/blackmail.html
IS ISRAEL BLACKMAILING AMERICA?
FOX NEWS SPIKES FOUR PART STORY
ON PHONE TAPPING SCANDAL
“It turns out that Israel has had a potential wiretap on every phone in America for years, along with the ability to monitor and record who any person is calling, anywhere in America; information of great value even if one does not listen to the calls themselves. Amdocs, Inc. the company which sub contracts billing and directory services for phone companies around the world, including 90 percent of American phone companies, is owned by Israeli interests. Yet another company, Comverse Infosys, is suspected of having built a “back door” into the equipment permanently installed into the phone system that allows instant eavesdropping by law enforcement agencies on any phone in America.”
This is a four part series that was was put together by Carl Cameron of Fox news just after 9/11. Fox News was forced to take this off of their website. This series has to do with “alleged” Israeli spying on the U.S. and the Israeli based communication companies (datamining) that have “allegedly” been compromised or infiltrated.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWpWc_suPWo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....mp;search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....mp;search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....mp;search=
Someone has changed the name of the last two clips. They were not always titled like this. (and it is flat out wrong) Wonder if this was done purposely. The third report has the most about Comverse and Amdocs
Watch all four parts of this series you will learn a great deal about Amdocs and Comverse Infosy and how the data mining of both of these companies may have been infiltrated
Take a look at Intelligence Directive 18 that McConnell wrote back in 1993 - it’s all there:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/N...../07-01.htm
Of course, on the other hand…the Dept. of Homeland Security can’t do proper background checks of their own employees, because it appears that some pedophiles are working for them in the cyber-sex/online pornography department. Just terrific!
/end angry sarcasm
If you want to learn about subversion, tap George Bush’s phone.
Check this out too. It is the “Library of intelligence and Surveillance Reference Documents”…lots and lots of stuff there:
http://www.tscm.com/reference.html
Colin Powells problems with the NSA/John Bolton.
The general’s revenge
Colin Powell, no longer the loyal soldier, rises up to help stop conservative hard-liner John Bolton from becoming U.N. ambassador.
By Sidney Blumenthal
http://dir.salon.com/story/opinion/blumenthal/20
05/04/28/powells_revenge/index.html
“The Bolton confirmation hearings have revealed his constant efforts to undermine Powell on Iran and Iraq, Syria, and North Korea. They have also exposed a most curious incident that has triggered the administration’s stonewall reflex. The Foreign Relations Committee discovered that Bolton made a highly unusual request and gained access to 10 intercepts by the National Security Agency, which monitors worldwide communications, of conversations involving past and present government officials. Whose conversations did Bolton secretly secure and why?
Staff members on the committee believe that Bolton was likely spying on Powell, his senior advisors, and other officials reporting to the secretary of state on diplomatic initiatives that Bolton opposed. If so, it is also possible that Bolton was sharing this top-secret information with his neoconservative allies in the Pentagon and the vice president’s office, with whom he was in daily contact and well known to be working in league against Powell. If the intercepts are ever released, they may disclose whether Bolton was a key figure in a counterintelligence operation run inside the Bush administration against the secretary of state, resembling the hunted character played by Will Smith in “Enemy of the State.” Both Republican and Democratic senators have demanded that the State Department, which holds the NSA intercepts, turn them over to the committee. But Rice so far has refused. What is she hiding by her coverup?”
Connect the NSA…….
Oklahoma kiddo @ 36
Ya never know….wouldn’t that be the “bomb”.
Wonder if we, in this house are listed as undesirables. Where are they going to deport me to? Oklahoma?
Kathleen at 38
What you’ve given us, I think, is a preview of coming attractions.
LS @ 34
Here’s my ‘favorite’ page as a I scrolled along:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/N...../07-14.htm
Anything to hide? LOL
Yet another way in which America is screwing Iraq
KayInMaine @ 42
Someone posted back on TPM when all the doc dumps were happening, that there is a way with your computer to actually read “through” that kind of redaction to see what it says. I lost the link, when my computer crashed awhile back. The commenter’s kid figured out how to do it accidentally by hitting a few keys.
Who was listening to Powell’s negotiations? Did Bolton access these intercepts that recorded Powell’s conversations?
Who else intercepted these?
Were these two communication companies Amdocs and Comverse Infosy “infiltrated” or compromised”?
Oklahoma kiddo @ 40
naw, since iirc you and Lahoma are Native Americans, they will have to deport you to…….uh…….
oh. Guess it is Oklahoma after all.
Has anyone heard if the House Homeland Security committee or Jane Harmon put a stop to the nameless program…conducting air drone and satellite surveillance of all of us without a warrant by DHS and your local Barney Fife scheduled to start Oct. first?
Jonathan @ 41
Been in the works for five years..the MSM not touching it.
There are definitely days when I feel like this
LS @ 44
The commenter’s kid figured out how to do it accidentally by hitting a few keys…
I suppose the commenters kid was a math genius. Or maybe a three-year-old, playing with the keyboard. Either way, I feel so much safer already.
“Iran unveils new missle after… France warned the world to prepare for war.”
Iran has unveiled a new long-range missile among an array of armaments displayed in an annual military parade commemorating the country’s 1980-88 war with Iraq.
The missile, known as the Ghadr - meaning power - has a 1,800km range, officials say, putting US military bases in the Gulf within range.
RevDeb @ 13
My experience is that MoveOn’s thank-you emails are as prompt as ActBlue. Right away. Did you check your spam folders or junk folders?
Hugh very graciously filled me in on the McConnell on a recent comment thread. So I’ve been paying more attention. Looks like McConnell is a habitual liar and unscrupulous thug. The TPM post below is interesting: lookis like McConnell has been representing inability or unwillingness of administration officials to follow any sensible procedure (legalwise or commonsensewise) at all is the reason for the ‘old FISA problem’ not anything to do with the old FISA law itself.
And below that post is a link to Rep Harmon saying that a false terror threat was used to stampede the congress into that horrible FISA vote this summer. What was McConnell’s role in that? And below that Harmon post on Thinkprogress (no permalink) is another post about McConnell fearmongering again.
Is McConnell another Gonzales? Time for hearings on him? I mean investigative hearings?
McConnell Tells More About Iraqi-Insurgent Wiretapping Episode
By Spencer Ackerman - September 20, 2007, 7:08PM
http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/004254.php
Harman: Conservatives Falsely Hyped Terror Threat Against U.S. Capitol To Pass FISA Expansion
http://thinkprogress.org/2007/.....or-attack/
McConnell again says public FISA debate will kill Americans.
Kathleen @ 48
question i have is, which dems, if given the opportunity to spy on opponents, would say, no, that’s not right?
Ed*ard Teller @ 50
Here it is:
http://www.salon.com/news/feat.....ex_np.html
Ya all are gonna make me cry…. until I see that pathology report and have it in my hand… it is only testing and guessing.
Yes it is ALL about power, for as long as I have known about the extra super-dupper xray vision spying I have said it is ALL about power.
Why do you have Hagel and Specter go out and make those grand stand statements but when it really counts…. They fold like a cheap suit.
First they get their guys in line and then they get the Dems so they get what they want NO matter what we say or do…
Exactly what right or amendment have these bozo’s not violated?
Hi y’all.
I read the post and most of the comments but I am confused.
What makes this different from all the tapping that they have been doing? Is a new part of it legal?
peanutbutter @ 49
Yes…I want to unsee and unhear a lot of things today. Thank you for the link re: Monsanto. Some of us talk like pirates once a year. Others act like ‘em all year round.
Pretty music: Dear Mr. President. (vid)
eureka-if you’re still here……etta james is on austin city limits this weekend…….thought you would want to know…….
kirk murphy @ 17
So I suppose it’s not a coincidence, then, that instead of Bush naming Paul Clement as the Acting Attorney General as he initially indicated he would when AGAG announced his resignation, Bush suddenly tapped Peter Keisler as the Acting AG catching even the DOJ off guard. Emptywheel’s conjectures about “why Keisler?” seem to be right on the money.
“one by one, our freedom and privacy are being taken away by government, ostensibly to protect us…”
Its being accomplished because hardly anyone KNOWS, thanks to our corporate media
SnarKassandra @ 57
The change from Homeland Security to NSA takes the wiretapping from being overseen by Joe Lieberman to being not overseen at all. This may be incrementally worse.
RevDeb @ 13
Kinda wierd, huh?
I’ve had trouble today emailing to Mommybrain about a Demo meet up with Howie.
Paranoid?
I always have trouble linking with my sister.
WTF.
But, she has hooked up with a M*slum who teaches Theology and Always they have trouble traveling to Canada, where he speaks.
Paranoia?
Innocent or whoops/F*ck?
I’m not sure.
(second try) Re comment at 53: I think I posted the wrong TPM permalink. This is the one I was referring to:
Source: McConnell’s Account of Insurgent Wiretap Controversy ‘Terrible’
By Spencer Ackerman - September 20, 2007, 8:07PM
http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/004255.php
Thank you Teddy SF.
oddmommy @ 46
Actually Lahoma is the 100 percenter. I’m a 1/2 breed. My father was Cherokee. My lady and me were both born in what used to be called ‘Indian Territory’. When Lahoma questions my judgement on things, she blames it on my white half. I adore this woman. ;0)
Kathy/Fozzetti @ 61
That plus they don’t care. You know, “why should you worry if you’ve got nothing to hide?” BS.
SnarKassandra @ 65
This stuff also involves the Internet, whereas the wire tapping stuff is more phones and the like (although of course the line with that is a little blurred with stuff like Vonage). I’m understanding “communications” here to include emails, IM’s, and the like, not just phone calls.
Kathy/Fozzetti @ 61
Kathy at 61,
I have friends and acquaintances who are well-educated, who of course loathe shrub and the Iraq clusterfuck, but who do not spend 1 second of one week doing the sorts of thinking and analyzing as are done here on FDL.
They don’t need to. They’re too secure and comfortable and smart and complacent.
The info is available!
TeddySanFran @ 52
yep. Someone is blocking them. I also sent them an e-mail saying that I haven’t been getting anything from them lately. No response.
For my love:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WQ7Yh8hDpc
peanutbutter @ 68
I already figure they’re doing that.
This is one of the issues that prob doesn’t bother kids as much as adults. I wrote about it a while ago:
“infrastructure - a term that includes telecommunications, power, gas, water, and transportation - is tied to the Net, vulnerabilities multiply. The threat of a terrorist attack is not merely that Web sites could fall offline or email could get zapped. With so many vital services susceptible to cracker tools and techniques, Clarke’s world is one in which an al Qaeda member or a hostile nation could snarl the IRS’s taxpayer database. Or snatch business secrets through a cunning Microsoft Outlook worm. Or flip the switch on New York City, disabling “electrical power grids and telephones as surely as if they had been destroyed,” Clarke has warned.”
Richard Clarke
http://www.wired.com/wired/arc.....larke.html Jonathan @ 54
OKK
People have always said to me it’s OK to talk to yourself, as long as you don’t answer.
(((((((katymine)))))))
Sorry this is OT, but I could use a bit of help. I’ve drafted a letter to the local paper re our up-for-reelection Senator (SuzieQ, not that it matters). But I’m not positive that I have all the facts straight. So please read and comment. Thanks!
………………………
Shame on Senator XXX. Last Wednesday, XXX voted against the restoration of habeas corpus, one of our most fundamental legal rights, suspended at the urging of the Bush administration.
Habeas corpus is the only civil liberty enshrined in the Constitution itself (the others are in the Bill of Rights, which was enacted later). It guarantees that anyone held by the authorities has the right to challenge the legality of their detention in court.
The measure that Senator XXX opposed would restore habeas to foreigners held by our authorities. Thus it would apply to the prisoners at Guantanamo, terrorists or not, who have been held for years without this right. Enacting this provision would not protect these detainees from trial and conviction if there is a case against them.
Citizens should also be concerned. Jose Padilla, whatever his crimes, is an American citizen. He was designated an “enemy combatant”, detained for several years and held in solitary confinement, all without access to a lawyer or a court. When charges were finally brought, they had almost nothing to do with the original allegations made against him.
Readers might think that the Guantanamo detainees and Padilla are extreme cases, deserving extreme measures. But only last January the Attorney General claimed, in testimony before Congress, that habeas does not apply to citizens either.
Habeas protects us all against arbitrary imprisonment. It is a bedrock principle of our legal system. Habeas dates at least to the Magna Carta (13th century). I can’t think of anything more important to our rights, or more fundamental to what America is and should remain. Unfortunately Senator XXX does not agree.
peanutbutter @ 68
All of it. Just decide that they already know everything and live with courage. They can’t destroy us all.
PeterK @ 76
All other rights, including the vaunted 2nd amendment, are useless without the habeas protection behind them. (assuming you’re in Maine with its hunting population)
Jonathan @ 54
At the John Bolton nomination hearings both Republicans (Warner, Chaffee, Voinovich) and Democrats (Kennedy, Kerry, Biden, Dodd, Boxer) were all clearly pissed about the Bush adminstration not turning over the NSA intercepts that were being demanded. I thought Senator Lincoln Chaffee (R), Kerry, Kennedy and Biden were going to jump over and beat the piss out of Bolton.
If you have not done so read that article by Sidney Blumenthal and the Generals Revenge
http://dir.salon.com/story/opi.....index.html
dmac @ 59
Thanks! Austin City Limits is on mid week here and I record every episode.. I guess you get to see her first. She did a great At Last on Tavis Smiley a couple weeks back.. I thought of you then because I know you watch Tavis..)
Oklahoma kiddo @ 51
Heck, if the Iranians threw a rock across the Straits of Hormuz, the US military bases in the Gulf would be within range.
PeterK,
as a lawyer, i say, Great Letter
right on, and beautifully written
Katymine, I’m so sorry to read about your health issues. Jane must be a real inspiration for you.
Atrios reporting that MoveOn has raised 1.5 mil since the ad. New goal is 2 mil.
Hot damn. You Go for it!
Egregious: “All of it. Just decide that they already know everything and live with courage. They can’t destroy us all.”
Very true, and words to live by.
My worry though, is the disruptions that could be caused. Not just tracking us, but preventing us from communicating with each other. Cutting off access to information.
Laura Doty @ 85
That is pretty scary!
RevDeb @ 70
Hi Here’s a little info on the info war.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/091307Z.shtml
jo6pac
Hi everyone.
I can tell you this: it’s not just the NSA, but also the DoD secret-police agency CIFA that’s trolling, as well. A week or so ago, I put up a piece at my place about the structure of a police state; you can imagine the feeling I got when I saw in my site logs less than twenty-four hours that they had been on my site. And I’m but a very small fish in a very big pond, hardly worth anyone’s attention.
RonD @ 88
How did you know it was them?
RevDeb @ 84
It was 500,000 the first day, from what I read. So, this is that much everyday.
My name is Deborah and I absolutely will stand up for what I believe in. MoveOn.org speaks for me!
Jonathan @ 82
Thanks!
On a related note, Glenn Greenwald has posted this article about the stealth effort for retroactive immunity for illegal surveillance activities by the Bush administration and its corporate co-conspirators. Per the current draft of their proposed immunity law:
There are two particularly distrubing aspects of this effort:
* This bill is being pimped by democratic insiders, e.g., Clinton adviser Jamie Gorelick.
* The attorney general who will certify which transgressions “would have been intended to protect the United States from terrorist attack” will be a respected judge put forward by a respected democratic senator.
So, with the passage of the MCA, which the democrats couldn’t be bother to filibuster, BushCo got retroactive immunity for their war crimes, and we lost habeas corpus. Now, with this bill that democratic operatives are pimping we’ll lose any ability to bring these bastards to justice for invading our privacy. Shucks!!!
Someone mentioned Etta.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....WQ7Yh8hDpc
SnarKassandra @ 89
The URL was a cifa.mil address, from an Army base in Va.
dakine01 @ 78
I think in a formal letter you should say Habeas Corpus .