Category Archives: NSA

Burdwan blast probe: NSA Doval in West Bengal, may meet Mamata
National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval is visiting West Bengal on Monday in connection with the Khagragarh blast in Burdwan district on October 2 that raised fears about a terror plot with...

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Burdwan blast probe: NSA Doval in West Bengal, may meet Mamata - Video

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This June 6, 213 file photo shows the sign outside the National Security Agency (NSA) campus in Fort Meade, Md.

WASHINGTON While Congress mulls how to curtail the NSA's collection of Americans' telephone records, impatient civil liberties groups are looking to legal challenges already underway in the courts to limit government surveillance powers.

Three appeals courts are hearing lawsuits against the bulk phone records program, creating the potential for an eventual Supreme Court review. Judges in lower courts, meanwhile, are grappling with the admissibility of evidence gained through the NSA's warrantless surveillance.

Advocates say the flurry of activity, which follows revelations last year by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden of once-secret intelligence programs, show how a post-9/11 surveillance debate once primarily hashed out among lawmakers in secret is being increasingly aired in open court not only in New York and Washington but in places like Idaho and Colorado.

"The thing that is different about the debate right now is that the courts are much more of a factor in it," said Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union. Before the Snowden disclosures, he said, courts were generally relegated to the sidelines of the discussion. Now, judges are poised to make major decisions on at least some of the matters in coming months.

Though it's unclear whether the Supreme Court will weigh in, the cases are proceeding at a time when the justices appear increasingly comfortable with digital privacy matters including GPS tracking of cars and police searches of cellphones.

The cases "come at a critical turning point for the Supreme Court when it comes to expectations of privacy and digital information," said American University law professor Stephen Vladeck.

Revelations that the government was collecting phone records of millions of Americans who were not suspected of crimes forced a rethinking of the practice, and President Barack Obama has called for it to end.

Since then, the House has passed legislation that civil libertarians say did not go far enough. In the Senate, Vermont Democrat Patrick Leahy, the Judiciary Committee chairman, is seeking a vote on a stricter measure to ban bulk collection, and it has bipartisan backing and support from the White House.

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NSA surveillance challenges moving through courts

No serious defense of the surveillance state can ignores its anti-democratic abuses, its lawbreaking, and its record of punishing whistleblowers.

Eddie Keogh/Reuters

In a New Republic article on NSA surveillance, Yishai Schwartz defends the U.S. government against the critiques of whistleblower Edward Snowden and his supporters. This defense warrants close scrutiny, because several of the arguments offered echo misinformation spread by national-security state officials.

The article begins by analyzing scenes in the Laura Poitras documentary Citizenfour where Snowden is holed up in a Hong Kong hotel, anxious that authorities might burst through the door and arrest him at any moment. "The implication is that Snowden has been targeted and persecuted by the government because he is a dissenter," Schwartz writes. "This is false. Snowden is a dissenter, but he is also a law-breaker. And the latter is the reason he has been targeted .... The government seeks to punish Snowden in order to make an example, but it is an example to future law-breakers (and in particular, those who expose classified information), not to deter future dissenters. Snowden happens to fit into both categories, but most dissenters do not, and they have nothing to fear."

Tell that to NSA whistleblower William Binney. In 2007, a dozen FBI agents stormed into his house with weapons drawn. "One of them ran upstairs and entered the bathroom where Mr. Binney was toweling off after a shower, pointing a gun at him," The New York Times reported. "Agents carried away a computer, disks and personal and business records .... Mr. Binney spent more than $7,000 on legal fees. But far more devastating, he said, was the N.S.A.s decision to strip his security clearance ... costing him an annual income of $300,000."

'What the War on Terror Actually Looks Like': Laura Poitras on Citizenfour

Or consider Thomas Drake, who was careful to avoid revealing classified information in correspondence with a reporter about NSA waste, fraud, and abuse. Jane Mayer documents the trumped-up charges used to persecute him and destroy his career. Or ponder Jesselyn Radack's story.

Is Schwartz unaware of these people? Surely he is at least familiar with Poitras, whose film he is reviewing. She committed no crimes when making documentaries about Iraq and Gitmo, yet wound up on a secret government watch list, subjecting her to harassment, interrogations, and equipment seizures. The claim that lawful dissenters "have nothing to fear" is demonstrably false.

* * *

A bit later in Schwartz's article, he objects to the argument that "our surveillance programs are unnecessary, that increases in government capabilities inherently infringe on our liberty, and warns ominously that dictatorships begin their oppression with the collection of data," countering that "surveillance is essential to countering threats from both terrorists and state espionage in the world today."

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Comforting the NSA and Afflicting Its Dissenters

FILE - In this file image made from video released by WikiLeaks on Oct. 11, 2013, former National Security Agency systems analyst Edward Snowden speaks in Moscow. Faced with congressional inaction to curtail the NSA?s bulk collection of Americans? telephone records, civil liberties groups are looking to cases already in the courts as a quicker way to clarify just what surveillance powers the government should have. Three appeals courts are hearing challenges to the National Security Agency phone records program, creating the potential for an eventual Supreme Court review. Judges in lower courts are grappling with the admissibility of evidence gained through the NSA?s warrantless surveillance. The flurry of activity follows revelations last year by former contractor Edward Snowden of once-secret intelligence collection programs. (AP Photo, File)(The Associated Press)

WASHINGTON While Congress mulls how to curtail the NSA's collection of Americans' telephone records, impatient civil liberties groups are looking to legal challenges already underway in the courts to limit government surveillance powers.

Three appeals courts are hearing lawsuits against the bulk phone records program, creating the potential for an eventual Supreme Court review. Judges in lower courts, meanwhile, are grappling with the admissibility of evidence gained through the NSA's warrantless surveillance.

Advocates say the flurry of activity, which follows revelations last year by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden of once-secret intelligence programs, show how a post-9/11 surveillance debate once primarily hashed out among lawmakers in secret is being increasingly aired in open court not only in New York and Washington but in places like Idaho and Colorado.

"The thing that is different about the debate right now is that the courts are much more of a factor in it," said Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union. Before the Snowden disclosures, he said, courts were generally relegated to the sidelines of the discussion. Now, judges are poised to make major decisions on at least some of the matters in coming months.

Though it's unclear whether the Supreme Court will weigh in, the cases are proceeding at a time when the justices appear increasingly comfortable with digital privacy matters including GPS tracking of cars and police searches of cellphones.

The cases "come at a critical turning point for the Supreme Court when it comes to expectations of privacy and digital information," said American University law professor Stephen Vladeck.

Revelations that the government was collecting phone records of millions of Americans who were not suspected of crimes forced a rethinking of the practice, and President Barack Obama has called for it to end.

Since then, the House has passed legislation that civil libertarians say did not go far enough. In the Senate, Vermont Democrat Patrick Leahy, the Judiciary Committee chairman, is seeking a vote on a stricter measure to ban bulk collection, and it has bipartisan backing and support from the White House.

As Congress considers the matter, the federal judiciary has produced divided opinions.

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As Congress mulls reining in NSA phone records collection, attention turns to court challenges

On the eve of his visit to Bardhaman in West Bengal, where two suspected members of Jamaat-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) were killed in the October 2 bomb blast, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval said there appeared to be a large network of the banned group that the investigators were working to unravel.

Mr. Doval told The Hindu that both Indian and Bangladeshi governments were working in close coordination in the fight against terrorism. Both the countries enjoy excellent bilateral relations and we have been working together, he said.

The NSA said the case had serious implications and required a comprehensive investigation. Special Secretary (Internal Security) Prakash Mishra and representatives of the Research and Analysis Wing, the Intelligence Bureau and the National Investigation Agency may accompany the NSA to West Bengal. NIA Director-General Sharad Kumar had earlier visited Bardhaman and Murshidabad on October 24.

Suvojit Bagchi from Kolkata reports

NSA to visit Bardhaman site

National Security Adviser Ajit Doval is expected to visit the blast site in Bardhaman in West Bengal and meet Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday. He is also expected to meet officers of the Central agencies in Kolkata. This is the second time the NSA is coming to Kolkata since the Trinamool Congress came to power in 2011. While in 2011, the then NSA Shivshankar Menon came to discuss the issue of Teesta water-sharing with Bangladesh, Mr. Doval is coming to discuss the security situation following increased tensions after the blast in Bardhaman earlier this month and identification of 58 suspected terror modules in the border State. The NIA has said proscribed Bangladesh terror group JMB was responsible for the blasts. Terror modules in West Bengal were making explosive devices to be used in Bangladesh.

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NSA sees large network behind Bardhaman blast

FORT MEADE, Md., Oct. 25 (UPI) -- Teresa Shea has been the director of signals intelligence, or SIGINT, at the National Security Agency since 2010, but she will no longer maintain that position. Reports of a possible conflict of interest arose recently, though the NSA claims that's not the reason she will be leaving her job.

Buzzfeed's Aram Roston has followed Shea's career, and released several reports pointing to a complex web of associations with NSA contractors. An NSA spokesman reportedly confirmed to Buzzfeed Shea will be leaving her position at SIGINT.

SIGINT is a part of the NSA that intercepts communications, which includes the domestic surveillance program revealed by Edward Snowden. SIGINT is often involved in breaking very complicated encryptions to access private communications around the world.

DRS Signals Solutions is a company that provides products and services to the NSA, and Shea's husband is its vice president. Her husband is also involved with a company -- based out of their home -- that has connections with SIGINT. Further, Roston found she owns an "electronics business," as he puts it, that owns an airplane and a condominium in South Carolina and also runs out of her home, but he has not established exactly what that company does.

Roston reports Shea could stand to profit from her businesses based on her position at the top of SIGINT.

The NSA spokesman told Buzzfeed Shea leaving her position was "planned well before recent news articles," and that she remains employed by the agency.

2014 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI's prior written consent.

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Top NSA spy is leaving position after conflict of interest accusations

Ex NSA Analyst Mickey Duniho Testifies to the Limited, Fallible Use of Logic and Accuracy Test
Did Expert Witness, Activists Thwart a Rove Ohio Vote Plot? Written by Andrew Kreig Published on November 9, 2012 A software expert #39;s testimony last week may...

By: AUDITAZ

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Ex NSA Analyst Mickey Duniho Testifies to the Limited, Fallible Use of Logic and Accuracy Test - Video

NSA SPIONASCHE

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NSA SPIONASCHE - Video

George Galloway Sputnik: NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden film (25Oct14)
The Guardian newspaper #39;s tntelligence journalist Ewen MacAskill, talks about the release of a film about NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, and his heroic attempt to disclose the criminality...

By: liarpoliticians

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George Galloway Sputnik: NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden film (25Oct14) - Video

Edward Snowden NSA Leaker: Prosecutors Plan to Prosecute Rogue NSA Whistle-Blowe
Provisions of the Espionage Act may be used to bring charges against Edward Snowden. For more on this story, click here:

By: News 01

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Edward Snowden NSA Leaker: Prosecutors Plan to Prosecute Rogue NSA Whistle-Blowe - Video