Revealed: NSA collecting phone records of millions of Americans daily | World news The National Security Agency is currently collecting the telephone records of millions of US customers of Verizon, one of America's largest telecoms providers, under a top secret court order issued in April. The order, a copy of which has been obtained by the Guardian, requires Verizon on an "ongoing, daily basis" to give the NSA information on all telephone calls in its systems, both within the US and between the US and other countries. The document shows for the first time that under the Obama administration the communication records of millions of US citizens are being collected indiscriminately and in bulk – regardless of whether they are suspected of any wrongdoing. The secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (Fisa) granted the order to the FBI on April 25, giving the government unlimited authority to obtain the data for a specified three-month period ending on July 19. The unlimited nature of the records being handed over to the NSA is extremely unusual.
U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio and video chats, photographs, e-mails, documents, and connection logs that enable analysts to track foreign targets, according to a top-secret document obtained by The Washington Post. The program, code-named PRISM, has not been made public until now. Equally unusual is the way the NSA extracts what it wants, according to the document: “Collection directly from the servers of these U.S. London’s Guardian newspaper reported Friday that GCHQ, Britain’s equivalent of the NSA, also has been secretly gathering intelligence from the same internet companies through an operation set up by the NSA. According to documents obtained by The Guardian, PRISM would appear to allow GCHQ to circumvent the formal legal process required in Britain to seek personal material such as emails, photos and videos from an internet company based outside of the country.
Justice Department Fights Release of Secret Court Opinion Finding Unconstitutional Surveillance In the midst of revelations that the government has conducted extensive top-secret surveillance operations to collect domestic phone records and internet communications , the Justice Department was due to file a court motion Friday in its effort to keep secret an 86-page court opinion that determined that the government had violated the spirit of federal surveillance laws and engaged in unconstitutional spying. This important case—all the more relevant in the wake of this week's disclosures—was triggered after Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a member of the Senate intelligence committee, started crying foul in 2011 about US government snooping. As a member of the intelligence committee, he had learned about domestic surveillance activity affecting American citizens that he believed was improper. He and Sen. For those who follow the secret and often complex world of high-tech government spying, this was an aha moment. It took the Justice Department four months to reply.
A guide to FISA §1881a: The law behind it all Simply put, the National Security Agency is an intelligence agency. Its purpose is to monitor the world's communications, which it traditionally collected by using spy satellites, taps on cables, and placing listening stations around the world. In 2008, by making changes to U.S. law, the U.S. Congress enabled the NSA to make U.S. industry complicit in its mission. No longer would the NSA have to rely only on international gathering points. Below we carefully analyse the legal framework around these requests. Of particular concern is U.S. law's distinction between foreigners and U.S. citizens or residents -- legally referred to as "U.S. persons." About the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act § 1881a (a.k.a. FISA was established in 1978 in response to abuses in domestic intelligence surveillance powers. Who may be targeted? The law authorizes surveillance to be used against any individual or group of non-U.S. persons outside of the U.S. For what purposes can these powers be used? No. Yes.
Burgers vinden veiligheid vaak belangrijker dan privacy - Politiek-digitaal.nl Van onze redactie - maandag, 25 10 2004 20:00 Nederlanders hebben geen moeite met het prijsgeven van privacy, als dat meer veiligheid oplevert. Ruim 85% vindt cameratoezicht prima en bijna iedereen is voor toepassing van DNA-technieken, zo blijkt uit een rapport over de toekomst van het Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau. De conclusies staan in schril contrast met de ‘Big Brother Awards’ die vandaag uitgereikt werden aan de grootste privacyschenders van het afgelopen jaar. Aantasting privacy nauwelijks een probleemDeze technieken kunnen de privacy van burgers aantasten, maar dit wordt door de bevolking nauwelijks als probleem ervaren. Big Brother Awards 2004De onverschilligheid van burgers op het gebied van hun persoonlijke levenssfeer is, naar alle waarschijnlijkheid, de digitale burgerrechtenorganisatie Bits of Freedom (BOF) een doorn in het oog. Minister Donner van Justitie viel wederom in de prijzen.
Officials: NSA mistakenly intercepted emails, phone calls of innocent Americans As President Obama defends government information mining programs, many questions rise to the surface about the nature of the program and the way the information is used. Vincent Cannistraro, former CIA counter terror chief, discusses his experience with counter-terrorism efforts and how FISA was born and grew. By Michael Isikoff National Investigative Correspondent, NBC News The National Security Agency has at times mistakenly intercepted the private email messages and phone calls of Americans who had no link to terrorism, requiring Justice Department officials to report the errors to a secret national security court and destroy the data, according to two former U.S. intelligence officials. At least some of the phone calls and emails were pulled from among the hundreds of millions stored by telecommunications companies as part of an NSA surveillance program. Ret. The judges “were really upset about this,” said the former official. Related story More from Open Channel:
Secret Court Ruling Put Tech Companies in Data Bind FISA requests can be as broad as seeking court approval to ask a company to turn over information about the online activities of people in a certain country. Between 2008 and 2012, only two of 8,591 applications were rejected, according to data gathered by the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a nonprofit research center in Washington. Without obtaining court approval, intelligence agents can then add more specific requests — like names of individuals and additional Internet services to track — every day for a year. National Security Letters are limited to the name, address, length of service and toll billing records of a service’s subscribers. Because national security requests ban recipients from even acknowledging their existence, it is difficult to know exactly how, and how often, the companies cooperate or resist. The Yahoo ruling, from 2008, shows the company argued that the order violated its users’ Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures.
NSA surveillance: The US is behaving like China | Ai Weiwei Even though we know governments do all kinds of things I was shocked by the information about the US surveillance operation, Prism. To me, it's abusively using government powers to interfere in individuals' privacy. This is an important moment for international society to reconsider and protect individual rights. I lived in the United States for 12 years. This abuse of state power goes totally against my understanding of what it means to be a civilised society, and it will be shocking for me if American citizens allow this to continue. The US has a great tradition of individualism and privacy and has long been a centre for free thinking and creativity as a result. In our experience in China, basically there is no privacy at all – that is why China is far behind the world in important respects: even though it has become so rich, it trails behind in terms of passion, imagination and creativity. But still, if we talk about abusive interference in individuals' rights, Prism does the same.
UK gathering secret intelligence via covert NSA operation | Technology The UK's electronic eavesdropping and security agency, GCHQ, has been secretly gathering intelligence from the world's biggest internet companies through a covertly run operation set up by America's top spy agency, documents obtained by the Guardian reveal. The documents show that GCHQ, based in Cheltenham, has had access to the system since at least June 2010, and generated 197 intelligence reports from it last year. The US-run programme, called Prism, would appear to allow GCHQ to circumvent the formal legal process required to seek personal material such as emails, photos and videos from an internet company based outside the UK. The use of Prism raises ethical and legal issues about such direct access to potentially millions of internet users, as well as questions about which British ministers knew of the programme. In a statement to the Guardian, GCHQ, insisted it "takes its obligations under the law very seriously". The existence of Prism, though, is not in doubt.