New revelations about NSA surveillance systems show that it was enough to fill in a short ‘justification’ form before gaining access to any of billions of emails, online chats, or site visit histories through a vast aggregation program called XKeyscore.
The structure of XKeyscore, leaked by the UK’s Guardiannewspaper, is sourced from a classified internal presentation from 2008 and a more recent Unofficial User Guide, presumably obtained by Edward Snowden when he was a contractor for the National Security Agency in the past year.
It shows that XKeyscore – then located on 750 servers around 150 sites worldwide – is a vast collection and storage program that served as the entry point for most information that was collected by the NSA. The Guardian claims that in one 30-day period in 2012 the program acquired 41 billion records.
The information is not just metadata – depersonalized analytical usage statistics that allow spies to spot patterns – but includes almost all types of personal information. Using almost any piece of personal data on a subject – an email address, or the IP address of a computer – an agent could look up all online user activities, such as Google map searches, website visits, documents sent through the internet or online conversations. The service operates both, in real time, and using a database of recently stored information.
All that appears to have been necessary to log into the system is to fill in a compulsory line on a form that gave a reason for why a certain person needed to be investigated. The form was not automatically scanned by the system or a supervisor, and did not require a US legal warrant, as long as the person whose name was typed in was a foreigner (even if his interactions were with a US citizen).
The slides appear to vindicate security specialist Edward Snowden’s claims made during the original video he recorded in Hong Kong last month.
“I, sitting at my desk, could wiretap anyone, from you or your accountant, to a federal judge or even the president, if I had a personal email,” he claimed then.
Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee later said that Snowden was “lying”.
Edward Snowden and Mike Rogers.(AFPPhoto / The Guardian / Mandel Ngan)
The NSA has issued a statement to the Guardian, which does not now appear to deny the capabilities of XKeyscore, but merely to defend its use.
“NSA’s activities are focused and specifically deployed against – and only against – legitimate foreign intelligence targets in response to requirements that our leaders need for information necessary to protect our nation and its interests,” said the NSA.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has issued certificates for two types of unmanned aircraft for civilian use. The move is expected to lead to the first approved commercial drone operation later this summer.
The two unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) are the Scan Eagle X200 and Aero Vironment’s PUMA. They both measure around 4 ½ feet long, weighing less than 55 pounds, and have a wing span of ten and nine feet respectively.
Both the Scan Eagle and the PUMA received “restricted category type certificates”which permit aerial surveillance. Prior to the FAA’s decision, the only way the private sector could operate UAS in US airspace was by obtaining an experimental airworthiness certificate which specifically restricts commercial operations.
The PUMA is expected to support emergency response crews for wildlife surveillance and oil spill monitoring over the Beaufort Sea to the north of Canada and Alaska. The Scan Eagle will be used by a major energy company off the Alaskan Coast to survey ice floes and migrating whales in Arctic oil exploration areas.
The issuing of the certificates is seen as an important step to integrating UAS into US airspace. Both drone operations will meet the requirements of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, which includes a mandate to increase Arctic UAS commercial operations.
Most non-military use of drones in the US has so far been limited to the police and other government agencies. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in March that drones will soon be used by the NYPD and will become as ubiquitous as security cameras.
Documents released by the American civil Liberties Union (ACLU) via the Freedom of Information Act have revealed that the US Marshals Service has also experimented with the use of drones for domestic surveillance.
Military drones are used extensively by the US Air Force for targeting terrorist suspects in several countries, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Yemen.
The strikes have been highly controversial, as they are ordered without the knowledge or participation of the countries concerned, and are sometimes inaccurate and kill civilians.
Pakistan’s relations with the US have been soured because of drone strikes. Just last month, the new government in Islamabad summoned a top US envoy who was given a letter of protest against drone strikes by the US military.
In May, a Pakistani court ruled that US drone strikes in its tribal regions should be considered war crimes, and that the government should use force to protect its civilians.
In a sensational article in a UK newspaper last weekend, the former head of MI6, the UK’s foreign intelligence agency, appears to have broken the code of omertà around the fraudulent intelligence case used as the pretext for the Iraq war in 2003.
Sir Richard Dearlove, former head of MI6 and current Master of Pembroke College, Cambridge, contacted the UK’s Mail on Sunday newspaper to say he had written his version of the (ab)use of intelligence in the runup to the US/UK invasion of Iraq. With the long-awaited and much-delayed official Chilcot Enquiry into the case for war about to be published, Dearlove is obviously aware that he might be blamed for the “sexing up” of the intelligence, and that‘Teflon’ Tony Blair might once again shuffle off all responsibility.
You’ll no doubt have some vague recollection that, in the run-up to the 2003 Iraq War, the British government produced a couple of reports “making a case for war”, as Major General Michael Laurie said in his evidence to the enquiry in 2011: “We knew at the time that the purpose of the [September] dossier was precisely to make a case for war, rather than setting out the available intelligence, and that to make the best out of sparse and inconclusive intelligence the wording was developed with care.”
The first such report, the September Dossier (2002), is the one most remembered, as this did indeed “sexed up” the case for war as the deceased Iraqi weapons inspector Dr David Kelly exposed. It also included the fraudulent intelligence about Saddam Hussein trying to acquire uranium from Niger. It was this latter claim that Colin Powell used to such great effect at the UN Security Council.
Rupert Murdoch
Also, just six weeks before the attack on Iraq, the “Dodgy”Dossier, based largely on a 12-year old PhD thesis culled from the internet, but containing nuggets of raw MI6 intelligence — was presented by spy and politician alike as ominous premonitory intelligence.
Most memorably in the UK, it led to the bogus “Brits 45 minutes from Doom” front-page headline in Rupert Murdoch’s The Sun newspaper, no less, on the eve of the crucial war vote in Parliament.
Interestingly from a British legal position, it appears that Tony Blair and his spin doctor Alastair Campbell, released this report without the prior written permission of the head of MI6, which means that they would appear to be in breach of the UK’s draconian secrecy law, the Official Secrets Act (1989).
Thus was made the dodgy case for war. All lies — millions of deaths and many more maimed, wounded, and displaced, yet no one held to account.
Subsequently, there was also the notorious leaked Downing Street memo, where Sir Richard Dearlove was minuted as saying that the intelligence and facts were being fitted around the [predetermined war] policy.
On July 23, 2002 at a meeting at 10 Downing Street, Dearlove briefed Tony Blair and other senior officials on his talks with his American counterpart, CIA Director George Tenet, in Washington three days before.
AFP Photo
In the draft minutes of that briefing, which were leaked to the London Times and published on May 1, 2005, Dearlove explains that George Bush had decided to attack Iraq and the war was to be “justified by the conjunction of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction.” While then-Foreign Secretary Jack Straw points out that the case was“thin,” Dearlove explains matter-of-factly, “the intelligence and facts are being fixed around the policy.”
There is no sign in the minutes that anyone hiccuped — much less demurred — at “making a case for war” and furthering Blair’s determination to join Bush in launching the kind of “war of aggression” outlawed by the post-world war Nuremberg Tribunal and the UN treaty.
The acquiescence of the chief spies helped their political masters mainline into the body politic un-assessed, raw intelligence and forged documents, with disastrous consequences for the people of Iraq and the world.
Yet Dearlove long remained unrepentant. Even as recently as 2011, post-retirement and bloated with honours, he continued to deny culpability. When questioned about the Downing Street Memo during an address to the prestigious Cambridge University Union Society by the fearless and fearsomely bright student, Silkie Carlo, Dearlove tried grandiloquently to brush her aside.
But were the remarks in the Memo really “taken out of context” as Dearlove tried to assert? No – the text of the Memo was clear and explicit.
So Dearlove could potentially have saved millions of lives across the Middle East if he had gone public then, rather than now as he is threatening, with his considered professional opinion about the intelligence facts being fitted around a preconceived war policy.
Would it not be lovely if these retired servants of the crown, replete with respect, status and honours, could actually take a stand while they are in a position to influence world events?
Doing so now, purely to preserve his reputation rather than to preserve lives, is even more “ethically flexible” than you would normally expect of an average MI6 intelligence officer. Perhaps that is why he floated to the top of the organisation.
Dearlove is right to be worried about how both Chilcot and history will judge him. These intelligence failures and lies have been picked over and speculated about for years. They are an open secret.
But holding the gun of disclosure to the UK government’s head smacks of desperation. He is quoted as saying that he has no plans to breach the Official Secrets Act by publishing his memoirs. But by publishing an account of the run-up to the Iraq war, he would be still guilty of a breach of the OSA. It has been established under UK law that any unauthorised disclosure crosses the “clear bright line” of the law. And Dearlove seems well aware of this – his original plan was for his account to be made available after his death.
Rectum_DefendeI can see why he would plan that – firstly he would not risk prosecution under the draconian terms of the OSA, but his account would, in his view, set the record straight and protect his reputation for posterity. A posthumous win-win.
The official motto of the UK spies is “Regnum Defende” — defence of the realm. Serving intelligence officers mordantly alter this to “Rectum Defende” — politely translated as watch your back.
Dearlove seems to be living up to the motto. He must be one very frightened old man to be contemplating such premature publication.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
Moscow says security agency FSB is in talks with the FBI over Snowden. But the whistleblower will not be extradited to the US, a Kremlin spokesman said, adding he’s sure the fugitive NSA contractor will stop harming Washington if granted asylum in Russia.
“Russia has never extradited anyone, and will not extradite,” said Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
Russian President is not handling the case of the former CIA employee Edward Snowden, as “Snowden has not made any request that is subject to consideration by the head of the state,” Peskov added.
The issue of Snowden asking for temporary asylum “was not and is not on Putin’s agenda,” Peskov continued, saying that it lies in the sphere of the countries’ security agencies.
Head of the FSB Aleksandr Bortnikov and FBI Chief Robert Muller are engaged in the discussion over Snowden, Putin’s spokesman said Friday.
Responding to the question of whether the former NSA contractor will continue harming the US by leaking classified materials while in Russia, and if the situation is going to undermine Moscow’s ties with Washington, Peskov stressed that “the head of state has expressed strong determination not to allow this,” referring to Putin’s earlier statements.
“I have no doubt that this will be the case, no matter how the situation develops,” the spokesman added.
Meanwhile, the US Senate threatened Thursday that it might impose sanctions against any country that provides asylum to Snowden, including revocation or suspension of trade privileges and preferences.
The 30-year-old Snowden has been stripped of his US passport, and is wanted by the United States on espionage charges for carrying out one of the biggest security leaksin the American history.
The NSA leaker has been stuck in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport since his arrival from Hong Kong, and remains there while his asylum plea is being reviewed by Russian immigration authorities.
His request followed weeks of searching for a way to leave the country, which he had intended to pass through only briefly on his way to another destination.
A California police officer involved in the shooting of a pet dog last month has been promoted to sergeant.
City officials in El Monte, California are not releasing the name of the recently promoted police officer, but confirm that it’s one of two men caught on tape last month shooting a pet German shepherd.
The initial incident occurred on June 19 as two El Monte police officers were following up on a report of a runaway teenager. After one of the cops let himself in to the fenced area outside of the home of Cathy Luu and her husband Chi Nguyen, the family’s pet pit bull approached one of the officers, prompting him to briefly play with it. Things quickly took a nasty turn, however, with surveillance camera footage recorded by the family showing that moments later their pet German shepherd began quickly pacing across the yard. Fearing he’d be attacked, one of the officers opened fire and shot the dog.
Although the police department reportedly offered at first to pay the subsequent veterinary bill, a $7,000 price-tag proved too costly and the family ultimately ended up putting their dog down, the family said.
Now as an investigation into the shooting continues, one of the two officers caught on the family’s home surveillance camera has received a promotion.
“One officer involved in this incident did receive a promotion to sergeant; however the officer was selected for and notified of the promotion on June 12, well before the incident took place,” El Monte Police Chief Steven Schuster said in a written statement.
“Since this is an ongoing investigation, we could not rescind that promotion because it would have violated the officer’s rights under state law,” the chief said.
Schuster added that if the investigation reveals that either of the officers violated policy in handling the incident, then the department may choose to take disciplinary action.
The department has declined to name the officers involved, citing the investigation, but the San Gabriel Valley Tribune has identified them as Arlen Castillo and Kenneth Fraser. The paper noted that the El Monte Police Department’s Facebook book announced that Fraser and six others received promotions on July 1. Castillo has reportedly been reassigned to a different position, a maneuver that Chief Schuster told the Tribune was a “lateral move.”
Schuster said the investigation into the shooting could last several months.
“We have reached out to other police departments to find best practices and determine whether there is a need to change or augment our policies,” Schuster told the Tribune. “We are also referencing a recent report by the (U.S. Department of Justice) Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) that deals with this issue.”
Shortly after the shooting, El Monte Mayor Andrew Quintero said he was looking for a “quick and appropriate solution” with regards to the investigation.
“Our community and the Luu/Nguyen family deserve answers and closure quickly,” the mayor said.
Last month’s shooting happened just days before a similar incident in Hawthorne, California in which police officers were caught on camera fatally shooting a pet Rottweiler while arresting the dog’s owner. Officers at the Hawthorne Police Department have reportedly since received death threats as a result.
“These aren’t just threats of ill-will,” Hawthorne Police Chief Robert Fager told NBC News. “These are absolutely threats to life.”
The National Security Agency has invited certain members of Congress to a top secret, invitation only meeting to discuss a proposed amendment that could end the NSA’s ability to conduct dragnet surveillance on millions of Americans.
A letter circulated only to select lawmakers early Tuesday announced that NSA Director General Keith B. Alexander would host a question and answer session with members of Congress in preparation of a Thursday vote on Capitol Hill expected to involve an amendment introduced last month by Rep. Justin Amash (R-Michigan).
That amendment, a provision tacked along to a Department of Defense Appropriations Act along with nearly 100 others, aims to greatly diminish the NSA’s domestic spying powers in the wake of disclosures attributed to Edward Snowden, a 30-year-old former employee of Booz Allen Hamilton currently fighting extradition to the US where he faces charges of espionage for his role in leaking state secrets.
One of the leaked files released by Snowden to the UK’s Guardian newspaper details how the government’s interpretation of the PATRIOT Act’s Section 215 has allowed the NSA to collect call logs and other so-called “telephony metadata” pertaining to millions of Americans on a regular basis. If the Amash amendment is approved, it would end that authority.
The amendment, as it appears on the House of Representatives Committee on Rules website, “Bars the NSA and other agencies from using Section 215 of the Patriot Act to collect records, including telephone call records, that pertain to persons who are not subject to an investigation under Section 215.”
“It’s not a partisan issue. It’s something that cuts across the entire political spectrum,” Amash told the Rules panel. “In order for funds to be used by the NSA, the court order would have to have a statement limiting the collection of records to those records that pertain to a person under investigation,” Amash said, according to Politico. “If the court order doesn’t have that statement, the NSA doesn’t receive the funding to collect those records.”
Amash’s suggestion isn’t unheard of in the wake of a massive public backlash caused by Mr. Snowden’s disclosures, but it certainly isn’t sitting pretty with the NSA. According to Huffington Post, a letter circulated on Tuesday only hours after the Amash amendment was confirmed to be in order and expected to go up for vote this Thursday.
“In advance of anticipated action on amendments to the DoD Appropriations bill, Ranking Member C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger of the House Intelligence Committee invites your Member to attend a question and answer session with General Keith B. Alexander of the National Security Agency,” HuffPo quoted from the invitation.
The meeting, added journalist Ryan Grim, was scheduled to be held at a security level of top secret/SCI and was only open to certain lawmakers, echoing the secrecy involved in the very programs Amash aims to shut down.
In preparation for Amash’s amendment going up for vote, the activism group Demand Progress has http://act.demandprogress.org/letter/nsa_amash/a campaign in hopes it will encourage Americans to ask their representatives to vote in favor of the bill.
“As the NSA spying revelations continue to unfold, we increasingly find ourselves facing the reality that — at any moment — the federal government could be listening to our phone calls, watching our email traffic, keeping tabs on our Internet browsing, or worse,” the website reads. “But now we have our first real chance to fight back.”
Speaking to Huffington Post, Demand Progress executive director David Segal said, “To invoke that expert on surveillance George W. Bush: After this vote we’ll finally know who is with us in the cause to protect civil rights — and who is against us.”
A spokesperson for Rep. Amash told TIME Magazine on Tuesday afternoon that debate over the amendment is scheduled for Wednesday evening, with lawmakers expected to move for a vote the following morning. The amendment is being cosponsored by Rep. John Conyers, a Democrat from Amash’s home state of Michigan.
Edward Snowden and Mike Rogers.(AFPPhoto / The Guardian / Mandel Ngan)
AFP Photo
