Nsa Contractor Identifies Himself As Source

[Publicus]

I myself am attentive not to turn any thread into a bulletin board of newsclips, or into a running headline service.

The Forum function here is to discuss news on the basis of a newsclip topic per thread.

To discuss the topic presented in a newsclip by an OP.

And I dunno what the NSA listening in on a Vatican Conclave might mean to global security. I don't often quote Joe Stalin, but he did have a point when he asked how many divisions of troops the pope has.

So when I post a headline and exercise TVF's Fair Use policy, I discuss the matter. Rarely do I only post a headline and then leave it at that, in other words do a hit and run.

When I want to read headlines I go to the BBC, CNN or some such site on the www.

I come here to discuss the news presented in a newsclipping selected by Mod/Admin which then serves as the OP.

I just want to be clear on that.

[lomatopo]

Auto-pilot? Sheesh. What a doofus. At least they are finally admitting to "going to far".

John Kerry: NSA Spying Has 'Reached Too Far,' Was Happening 'On Autopilot'

Secretary of State John Kerry admitted Thursday that the NSA's surveillance programs have gone "too far" -- so much so that actions were occurring without knowledge from the Obama administration. Speaking via a video conference in London, Kerry acknowledged that reviews and changes were in order for the much-maligned agency.

"The president and I have learned of some things that have been happening in many ways on an automatic pilot, because the technology is there and the ability is there," he said, according to the Guardian.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/01/john-kerry-nsa-spying_n_4190711.html

[lomatopo]

It seems obvious to me that most/all charges will eventually be dropped against Mr. Snowden, save perhaps theft of government property, as they should be.

Snowden seeks world's help against charges

BERLIN (AP) — The U.S. refused to show any leniency to fugitive leaker Edward Snowden on Friday, even as Secretary of State John Kerry conceded that eavesdropping on allies had happened on "automatic pilot" and went too far.

Snowden made his appeal for U.S. clemency in a letter released Friday by a German lawmaker who met with him in Moscow. In it, the 30-year-old American asked for international help to persuade the U.S. to drop spying charges against him and said he would like to testify before the U.S. Congress about the National Security Agency's surveillance activities.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/

[manarak]

It seems obvious to me that most/all charges will eventually be dropped against Mr. Snowden, save perhaps theft of government property, as they should be.

Yes, the more that comes to light and the more 4 things become clear:

- the NSA is spying too much and on the wrong people

- the NSA lied and still lies about its activities, lies to its legal controllers (*)

- the spying has to be severely curtained and tightly controlled

- Snowden should not be prosecuted

The US need a law that forbids the NSA from collecting data without suspicion, i.e. data can only be collected if it is supposed to be connected to a precise surveillance case.

No fishing expeditions allowed.

(*) = I'm sure the latetest statements of Gen. Alexander denying NSA spying on NATO (and <insert any target here>) are technically correct, but if NSA didn't do it, then another agency or organisation or even foreign organisation (GCHQ?) did it and forward the intel to NSA... they are just lying through their teeth.

[lomatopo]

More detail/follow-up on the NSA's (and UK's GCHQ) apparently successful interception of encrypted Google and Yahoo traffic. The outright prevarication by the NSA mouthpieces is insulting.

How we know the NSA had access to internal Google and Yahoo cloud data

The Washington Post reported last Wednesday that the National Security Agency has been tapping into the private links that connect Google and Yahoo data centers around the world. Today we offer additional background, with new evidence from the source documents and interviews with confidential sources, demonstrating that the NSA accessed data traveling between those centers.

We do not know exactly how the NSA and GCHQ intercept the data, other than it happens on British territory. But we do know they are intercepting it from inside the Yahoo and Google private clouds, because some of what NSA and GCHQ collect is found nowhere else.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/11/04/how-we-know-the-nsa-had-access-to-internal-google-and-yahoo-cloud-data/

Detailed slides here...

What Yahoo and Google did not think the NSA could see

Today The Post answers some of the questions they raised in an explanatory story and offers additional evidence drawn from documents provided by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The documents do not tell the whole story, because our report depended in part on interviews with public and private sector sources. But these slides demonstrate that the NSA, working with the British GCHQ, intercepted information it could only have found inside the Google and Yahoo "clouds," or private networks.

http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/world/what-yahoo-and-google-did-not-think-the-nsa-could-see/555/

NSA lawyers do not dispute spying on Google, Yahoo data overseas

The lawyers also told the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board during a rare public hearing that a secret overseas Internet data-gathering program exposed last week was not an attempt to evade scrutiny by the federal intelligence court that supervises such operations

The government did not dispute that it tapped the cables overseas for Internet traffic but said it wasn't doing so to avoid U.S. legal restrictions.

http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_24450524/nsa-lawyers-do-not-dispute-spying-google-yahoo

[manarak]

I note that many who post here have chosen to focus on Edward Snowden's revelations of domestic surveillance activities by US government agencies that may or may not directly affect US citizens. There is merit to this pursuit and I support and encourage it. The truth in these matters relate directly to Constitutional rights, the Fourth Amendment in particular.

I however have chosen to focus on Snowden's unnecessary and harmful leaks of national and global security matters that are harmful to the United States and its allies. I am especially concerned and worried that national security information disclosed by Snowden has helped and enhanced terrorists and terrorism against the United States, both abroad and at home.

The latest national and global security violations by Edward Snowden are now being repudiated by Snowden's journalism accomplice, Glenn Greenwald of the Guardian newspaper in the UK. Greenwald has said he has withheld global national security information and now specifically criticized Snowden for indiscriminately disclosing US national and global security information that is harmful both to the US and its allies.

Here's some idea of the damage and criticisms Snowden is getting from national security officials and from Greenwald himself:

...

Yes, even allies spy on each other, and no, it is not illegal (but it may get you detained for prisoner trade, and it will definitely get you deported).

...

I'm replying to this older post on one detail: Greenwald's claim that spying is not illegal is wrong.

For example, German Law says that confidentiality of communications is inviolable, except under some circumstances with a German court warrant.

So anyone spying on German communications without such warrant is acting illegally.

[Publicus]

I certainly agree。

The US Government should have gone to a German court to seek approval to intercept the chancellor's phone conversations。

Then it would have been legal。

Correct。

Had the German court given approval。

[manarak]

I certainly agree。

The US Government should have gone to a German court to seek approval to intercept the chancellor's phone conversations。

Then it would have been legal。

Correct。

Had the German court given approval。

I see you 。understand 。about legality and illegality.

If a country does something illegal but is not rewarded by its victims with a declaration of war for its illegal acts, this doesn't make the acts acceptable.

About surrendering fugitive convicts, the US has no lessons to give:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Seldon_Lady

In the light of Snowden's revelations about US spying, it became clear that while some countries like China and Russia do spy on the US and their allies, they aren't number one in spying by a large margin. The USA is number one in spying, and has strictly no grounds for whining in public about being the target of foreign spying.

[Credo]

The other countries aren't number one because they don't have the technology to be number. You can rest assured that if they had the technology, they would use it.

In the spying business there is no honor.

[manarak]

The other countries aren't number one because they don't have the technology to be number. You can rest assured that if they had the technology, they would use it.

In the spying business there is no honor.

yes... I'm not pretending the other countries are better, but the point here is that the US have no reason for claiming the moral high ground or act the victim's part when it comes to spying.

Also the part about remanding / extraditing criminals seems to be a one-way argument for the US.

That's mostly the part I have trouble with, the hypocrisy.

[Credo]

With regard to spying, I don't think the US has claimed any moral high ground. I don't know that there is such a thing. Extraditing criminals, and I note that you refer to criminals because that is what Snowden is, is also not a one way street. It's an expectation but it doesn't happen and other countries put up just as big a fuss as the US does.

Hypocrisy is really not an operable word in the world of espionage.

[chuckd]

With regard to spying, I don't think the US has claimed any moral high ground. I don't know that there is such a thing. Extraditing criminals, and I note that you refer to criminals because that is what Snowden is, is also not a one way street. It's an expectation but it doesn't happen and other countries put up just as big a fuss as the US does.

Hypocrisy is really not an operable word in the world of espionage.

I must have missed the trial and conviction of Snowden making him a criminal.

He has been charged by a federal grand jury but that is all.

[Crushdepth]

The other countries aren't number one because they don't have the technology to be number. You can rest assured that if they had the technology, they would use it.

In the spying business there is no honor.

This is going to cost the IT industry in the US big $$$$. That might eventually change their minds, their companies are going to lose a shitload of foreign government and corporate contracts.

Impossible to trust them when the government can force them to spy, backdoor and steal confidential data and then lie about it.

[manarak]

With regard to spying, I don't think the US has claimed any moral high ground. I don't know that there is such a thing. Extraditing criminals, and I note that you refer to criminals because that is what Snowden is, is also not a one way street. It's an expectation but it doesn't happen and other countries put up just as big a fuss as the US does.

Hypocrisy is really not an operable word in the world of espionage.

oh yeah?

http://rockcenter.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/11/14369266-officials-say-chinese-spies-have-targeted-every-sector-of-the-us-economy

there are countless other pieces of US propaganda out there playing the victim of spying from Chinese, Russians and many other countries.

when one complains about being spied upon by another, it's implicit that the reverse is not the case, yet, as we know now ...

The US spying apparatus has so much more depth and reach, it's a bit like the US sitting in an A1M1 and complaining about the opponent being armed with AK47 and throwing stones.

[Credo]

The difference is what they are spying about. The US gov't does not run businesses and I doubt we are stealing information from businesses in China, for example, to undermine the Chinese economy.

[manarak]

The difference is what they are spying about. The US gov't does not run businesses and I doubt we are stealing information from businesses in China, for example, to undermine the Chinese economy.

again wrong, the US have routinely spied on foreign companies in the past, to steal technology but US agencies also passed the information to US corporations so they could outbid the foreign competition on international markets.

[Credo]

I think you would need to supply some documentation for that.

[manarak]

I think you would need to supply some documentation for that.

a recent article on that:

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/10/nsa-busted-conducting-industrial-espionage-in-france-mexico-brazil-and-other-countries.html

but there are well-known and well documented cases from older times, for example the case of US company Raytheon against French Thomson-CSF in a bid for radar equipment, where the US government even admitted to the spying.

These are the better known cases of abuse of ECHELON by the USA:

Examples of industrial espionage

Notable examples of members of the "Five Eyes" engaging in industrial espionage:

• In the early 1990s, the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted the communications between the European aerospace company Airbus and the Saudi Arabian national airline. In 1994, Airbus lost a $6 billion contract with Saudi Arabia after the NSA, acting as a whistleblower, reported that Airbus officials had been bribing Saudi officials to secure the contract.^[22] As a result, the American aerospace company McDonnell Douglas (now part of Boeing) won the multi-billion dollar contract instead of Airbus.^[23]

• The American defense contractor Raytheon won a US$1.3 billion contract with the Government of Brazil to monitor the Amazon rainforest after the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), acting as a whistleblower, reported that Raytheon's French competitor Thomson-Alcatel had been paying bribes to get the contract.^[24]

• In order to boost America's domestic automobile industry, the CIA eavesdropped on the conversations of the employees of Japanese car manufacturers Toyota and Nissan.^[25]

• In order to "enable better exploitation" of the infrastructure of the telecoms provider Belgacom, the British intelligence agency Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) hacked Belgacom's network with the help of the NSA.^[26]

On March 17, 2000, the former CIA director James Woolsey, Jr. defended his agency's surveillance activities regarding "ECHELON and U.S. spying on European industries". Writing in an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Woolsey argued that "we (the CIA) have spied on you (the Europeans) because you bribe".^[27]

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON

[Credo]

I would have to discount anything having to do with military hardware. There are very good reasons for wanting our materials in other countries and they are related to national defense.

Show me where we have stolen the plans for a something that is commercially viable.

[Credo]

Here's a quote from the link regarding Chinese theft of corporate business plans:

That includes blueprints for the next generation of auto parts, formulas for pesticides and pharmaceuticals, and other information that makes American companies competitive in the global marketplace.

Though the United States limits its espionage to national security interests, intelligence officials said, China has launched a well-organized campaign to steal American corporate secrets via the Internet.

[manarak]

I would have to discount anything having to do with military hardware. There are very good reasons for wanting our materials in other countries and they are related to national defense.

Show me where we have stolen the plans for a something that is commercially viable.

plan stealing is probably the part of the operations that is better hidden!

the above is of course only the top of the iceberg.

But Nissa, Toyota, Airbus, Belgacom... are all these military hardware?

And then I have to agree with you, the reason for the US to want US manufactured radar in Brazil is as least as valid as spying on the European trade delegation.

[manarak]

Though the United States limits its espionage to national security interests, intelligence officials said, China has launched a well-organized campaign to steal American corporate secrets via the Internet.

and after you read about the abuse of Echelon for commercial interests, you would agree that the "United States limits its espionage to national security interests" ??

they are lying through their teeth.

[Credo]

So let's see, the US is spying on Toyota and giving the plans for their new engine to General Motors? I don't think so. Oh, and then we buy engines from Toyota that we have stolen the plans for?

But hey, it's a nice try.

[manarak]

So let's see, the US is spying on Toyota and giving the plans for their new engine to General Motors? I don't think so. Oh, and then we buy engines from Toyota that we have stolen the plans for?

But hey, it's a nice try.

If one has got the technological edge, there is not much to steal, but still plenty of (well used) room to misbehave.

I'll try to find a case where plans have actually been stolen and I'll come back with the info.

(or it seems that the allegation is enough?? - where is the proof that the chinese stole these infamous blueprints?)

[Credo]

We could go on forever and get nowhere. The point is that the US gov't isn't stealing data from private companies overseas and then using it. The US gov't doesn't make anything, we don't directly support private businesses (outside of the national defense area). If something were stolen, do you think that giving to GM, for example, would go unnoticed by Ford?

I can't believe that anybody is actually surprised. Simple hackers have gotten into all kinds of things. Did anybody think that the gov't wasn't? Does anybody think a lot of other gov'ts aren't? Do you think a lot of them aren't sharing information with one another?

[Publicus]

So let's see, the US is spying on Toyota and giving the plans for their new engine to General Motors? I don't think so. Oh, and then we buy engines from Toyota that we have stolen the plans for?

But hey, it's a nice try.

If one has got the technological edge, there is not much to steal, but still plenty of (well used) room to misbehave.

I'll try to find a case where plans have actually been stolen and I'll come back with the info.

(or it seems that the allegation is enough?? - where is the proof that the chinese stole these infamous blueprints?)

Look, I'm gonna over simplify if only for the sake of it.

Since Einstein we know with certainty that everything is relative.

That said, one can also say there are good guys and that there are bad guys - and a bunch of people that are of various moralities in between. However, it's not a case of the good guys wearing white hats while the bad guys wear black hats. Any colors that might be involved in determining who on balance is which are varied and myriad.

That also said, on balance the CCP-PRC are the bad guys.

Decidedly so.

The fact is the CCP-PRC is a Marxist-Maoist-Leninist dictatorship that, in the 21st century is a censoring, punishing, elitist single party state and fascist dictatorship that detests democracy and human rights, and believes literally it has the inherent birthright to lord over all of the world irrespective of the rule of consensual international law.

To be absolutely clear, the United States cannot wear a white hat and makes no claims to being able to do so. If any government could wear a white hat, which government or governments would you identify for such a rare distinction?

And I'd be curious as to your paragraph summary of the United States, if you'd care to construct one.

Confidential report lists U.S. weapons system designs compromised by Chinese cyberspies

Designs for many of the nation’s most sensitive advanced weapons systems have been compromised by Chinese hackers, according to a report prepared for the Pentagon and to officials from government and the defense industry.

Among more than two dozen major weapons systems whose designs were breached were programs critical to U.S. missile defenses and combat aircraft and ships, according to a previously undisclosed section of a confidential report prepared for Pentagon leaders by the Defense Science Board.

In addition, a recent classified National Intelligence Estimate on economic cyber-espionage concluded that China was by far the most active country in stealing intellectual property from U.S. companies

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-05-27/world/39554997_1_u-s-missile-defenses-weapons-combat-aircraft

Snowden is in the hands of the Russian secret services which control his life completely, and Wikileaks is funded and controlled by Putin. Now I'd say they are also the bad guys. I think that one pretty much comes close to being black or white.

[manarak]

To be absolutely clear, the United States cannot wear a white hat and makes no claims to being able to do so.

Hey, that was the only point I was trying to get accross!

So we do agree on that.

[manarak]

the Petrobras affair:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/09/us-usa-security-snowden-petrobras-idUSBRE98817N20130909

[manarak]

Former CIA Director James Woolsey confirmed in an article in the Wall Street Journal in March that the US had engaged in industrial espionage against some of its European allies.

http://www.heise.de/tp/artikel/6/6662/1.html

Woolsey maintained that the products of US economic espionage were normally acted on by the US government rather than given to US companies to use. He claimed that the US had little need of high-tech espionage because "in a number of areas ... American industry is technologically the world leader".

However, this was "not universally true. There are some areas of technology where American industry is behind those of companies in other countries. [but] by and large American companies have no need nor interest in stealing foreign technology in order to stay ahead".

But if US intelligence did compile intelligence on technical breakthroughs by foreign companies, Woolsey believed that this would be passed on.

"Would [...] somebody do a technological analysis of something from a friendly country, which had no importance, other than a commercial use, and then let it sit on the shelf because it couldn't be given to the American company? I think that would be a misuse of the [intelligence] community's resources. I don't think it would be done."

which is exactly the point I made earlier in this thread.

[lomatopo]

the hypocrisy

No doubt we are number one in that, he says waving his giant foam finger chanting "U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A."

We're also number 1 in giant foam finger usage, although those are probably made in China, including Ms. Cyrus.