NSA Provides Heavily Redacted Report on Its "Improper Surveillance" of Americans

The elves at the NSA were certainly busy this holiday season. Besides their usual snooping activities, the agency prepared a report on instances of its "improper surveillance" of American citizens. The NSA did not exactly go into this project willingly; it was compelled via a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union.

The agency released its heavily redacted report on who was naughty or nice on the afternoon of Christmas Eve. A story about the information appeared in Bloomberg; the piece was later linked in a Washington Post roundup. The timing virtually guaranteed minimal public attention to an issue on which left-wing occupiers and right-wing liberty lovers should theoretically find common ground.

The NSA would not have even entertained providing these crumbs of knowledge of its business, except that Edward Snowden's revelations forced its hand. Coincidentally (or maybe not), a former naval officer filed suit this week in Kansas against the producers of Citizenfour, the Laura Poitras-directed documentary about Snowden's efforts to make public what the NSA most devoutly wished to reamin concealed. The suit alleges, among other things, the producers' intent to profiteer from the film. The story about the litigation appears in commondreams.org; a link to a PDF of the court papers appears courtesy of the information technology news website theregister.co.uk.

Scottish University Elects Edward Snowden as Its New Rector

The University of Glasgow elects a rector every few years to represent its students and to help administer university resources. That's the theory. In practice, students use the vote and the candidates to make a statement about some aspect of world affairs. No one expects the elected officials, who are often highly visible, globally known figures, to be involved in the academic institution's daily operations.

Edward Snowden

If history is any guide, the Glaswegian students are a feisty lot. According to a Financial Times article, the U's voters have nominated and elected figures such as Winnie Mandela to the rectorship. This year, the University of Glasgow student body has outdone its predecessors by electing none other than Edward Snowden as the university's next rector.

One can only wonder what the American government, which has branded Snowden a traitor, thinks of this development.

World Press Freedom Index: For the USA, no Gold, no Silver, no Bronze

A French-origin organization called "Reporters Without Borders" (or RSB, to follow the French acronym) recently released its "World Press Freedom Index." The measure calculates, in the venture's words, "the negative impacts of conflicts on freedom of information and its protagonists." The index does not offer Americans much solace: The United States ranked #46 in RSB's roundup. In fairness, a number of the 45 countries above the USA, such as Andorra and Cape Verde, have marginal global gravitas. However, America's press freedom -- a bulwark of our nation's Constitution -- seems to have eroded, thus reducing respect for information freedom here and around the globe.

Image/ad created by Publicis Brussels

Naturally, the Snowden affair loomed large in RSB's unflattering evaluation. And overall, the Obama Administration's ruthless intimidation tactics against whistleblowers and leakers (though not against its own sanctioned purveyors of privileged information) lowered RSB's estimate of American press freedom.

Our nation ought to be ashamed by the RSB report. Liberals, in particular, should look in its collective political mirror. The American left has reluctantly criticized the Administration for its blunt attempt to muzzle bad news through punitive jail terms, intimidating enforcement tactics, and Mafia-like silence. In fairness, news organizations, including strange bedfellows such as Fox News and The New York Times, have pushed back against 44's intent to silence those who attempt to illuminate his administration's darker corners. Alas, the champions of press freedom are diminishing in number and clout, while there is greater national comfort with corporate, political, and governmental secrecy.

PS. Thanks to the financial blog zerohedge.com for bringing this story to its readers' attention.

A Look Ahead to 2014's Surveillance Politics

Tech's high priests and their financial enablers continue to squirm under the harsh light the Snowden surveillance revelations cast on their activities. Naturally, Silicon Valley, which has viewed the developed world as its experimental animal, has decided to publicly stand tall against the alleged bad actors at the NSA.

A few caveats should make one pause in that convenient posture. Peter Thiel, Pay Pal principal and leading libertarian light in the Valley, happens to be a major investor in a firm called Palantir. This company was characterized in a recent Financial Times piece as "a secretive data-mining company that made its name working for the CIA..." Jeff Bezos' Amazon, which has been quiet in the entire NSA-Valley imbroglio, has a cloud computing contract with the Central Intelligence Agency. As for other tech firms, do you want to guess how many have federal contracts?

Peter Thiel

Meanwhile, the usual hypocritical "rule of law" arguments high tech trots out to defend its global interests and ruthless invasion of personal privacy have notably not emerged to protest the NSA's own data "extraction" efforts. After all, the NSA is a federal agency with broad mandates to protect and serve the nation. And that's the law, too.

A recent article in Wired suggests that diminished expectations for "business development" is a significant reason the Valley was shocked to discover gambling in its data collection and exploitation casino. Chris Finan's opinion piece -- "What To Expect From Surveillance Politics in 2014 (Hint: It's Not Reform)" -- asserts high tech's public outrage partly stems from anticipated international business losses as a consequence of the Snowden expose. Finan contends

it’s safe to say that American tech executives are angry. And they have good reason to be: U.S. companies’ association — via cooperation, coercion, or simply unwitting victimization — with government surveillance programs have cost them huge shares of the IT services market internationally.Forrester Research has projected that the overall impact to the U.S. cloud computing industry could be as high as $180 billion, or 25% of IT service provider revenues over three years. While many companies will try to convince policymakers of the the significant costs of intrusive surveillance and the need for reform — as a group of tech execs tried to do this week in a meeting with President Obama — expect companies to take matters into their own hands.

What's fascinating is the Valley's relentless determination to transform the world into a global data colony which these firms are free to exploit as they please. An essential piece of that initiative is the evisceration and degradation of personal privacy. Anyone who has received unwanted "targeted" advertising on their phones, tablets, or computers can grasp this concept. Why does the Valley insist it qualifies for an exemption from criticism over its arrogant, anti-privacy activities? The NSA, in this case, is a convenient pinata for actions high tech has developed, exploited, and tried to wink and nod its way through legal action and protest.

One wishes the Valley, in its collective sense, had a conscience that went beyond IPO "success" and an unwavering faith in "progress" (as defined by improved data mining and consumer gadgets). Those sentiments are rarely displayed. At least the NSA has a mission to guard our nation. The Valley's primary mission is to guard its own interests, its own egos, its own financial opportunities. Who do you trust, baby?

AP Report: NSA-Silicon Valley Struggle Centers on Profit That User Data Generates

The Snowden leaks revealed the global reach and evisceration of personal privacy the American military-tech complex routinely conducts. While Silicon Valley's highest profile search and social media firms have cried "foul" over the NSA's stunning data mining and analysis activities, these libertarian entrepreneurs are reticent to come clean about the depth and relentlessness of their collection of personal data. Of course, the money and power firms such as Google (yes, thanks for Blogger), Facebook, and Amazon now command should make one pause. However, few media outlets feel any urge to upset these data titans. (To this day, some major media outlets continue to identity data-driven Amazon's principal business as a retail concern, as if Jeff Bezos' ambition is simply to open an online version of The Home Depot.)

An Associated Press article appearing in today's siliconvalley.com attempts to illuminate certain truths animating the NSA-Silicon Valley struggle. AP reporters Michael Liedtke's and Marcy Gordon's useful piece gets to the heart of the matter: profit. The NSA's "violation of trust," according to the piece, has upset the Valley's expansion plans into emerging nations and their economies. Oops. Now nations such as Brazil are now at least publicly determined to keep close the data its citizens generate. Meanwhile, the Valley's lustful data expropriation and exploitation, along with its trumpeting of the virtues of "sharing," has produced a 21st Century version of colonialism that must certainly rub formerly colonized nations a very wrong way.

Facebook server farm in Sweden

The stakes are high for the Valley. As the AP story noted, countries in addition to Brazil "and international regulators are considering strict rules for data-handling by U.S. tech companies. If that were to happen, it could cripple the companies' crucial drive to grow in overseas markets, and could fracture the Internet's seamless inner-workings."

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NSA Chief Rips Media's Coverage of Surveillance Flaps

General Keith Alexander
(Image: abcnews.go.com)

NSA boss General Keith Alexander didn't get the memo about the federal government's shutdown. He's still on duty; I salute him for that action (no pun intended). America's Chief Surveillance Officer (CSO) did find time today to deliver a public speech to the Telecommunications Industry Association about the media's coverage of recent revelations about the NSA's surveillance efforts. The story appeared in today's online editions of The Washington Post.

His address to the collected telecom insiders repeated the NSA mantra about "damage" to the nation's security and how the media mismanaged reporting the spy agency's virtuous labors on behalf of freedom everywhere. Alexander, who also runs the military's Cyber Command, said somehow the nation would manage despite Edward Snowden's information about the extent of NSA snooping on ordinary American citizens. He noted l'affaire Snowden caused an erosion of trust, notably in the very industries the NSA has assiduously courted and, at times, strong armed. That's a fair point.

NYPD Surveillance Camera

However, Alexander did not allude to the increasing mistrust some Americans have toward allegedly "benign" surveillance. Then again, America's CSO doesn't have a profound desire for informed citizens to ponder what the NSA has wrought. He must have the insiders to buy into the "needs" of the surveillance state. He certainly does not want the extent of America's military-technology complex openly considered by a thoughtful electorate. Those industrial-governmental relationships were the heart of Snowden's revelations. I doubt General Alexander will be making any speeches on that topic in the near future.

FISA Court Upholds NSA Phone Snooping Tactics

Ellen Nakashima
(Image: cfp.org)

The NSA's sweeping (no pun intended) ability and evident willingness to aggressively data mine domestic phone conversations was upheld by a FISA judge this week. The Washington Post's Ellen Nakashima reported this story in today's online editions of the newspaper.

The FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) court is an American judicial anomaly. Its secret proceedings feature a plaintiff and no defendant. A government attorney makes a case, and a FISA jurist determines its suitability under the judge's interpretation of current federal statutes. The court straddles the line between a rubber stamp for NSA activities and a light touch of "judicial oversight."

Former US Attorney General
Alberto Gonzalez

One consequence of Edward Snowden's revelations was sharply increased doubt regarding the efficacy of the FISA court. The NSA seemed like an organization that could simply make up the rules of the game, and not inform anyone about them. The right to privacy? That notion seemed as "quaint" as George W. Bush's former attorney general Alberto Gonzalez once considered the Geneva Convention's protocols.

The recent FISA ruling the Post cites expands this alarming erosion of privacy rights. As Nakashima notes:

The gathering of "all call detail records" from phone companies is justified as long as the government can show that it is relevant to an authorized investigation into known -- and, significantly -- unknown terrorists who may be in the United States, the Aug. 29 opinion states.

Moreover, the government need only show that there are "reasonable grounds to believe" the records will be relevant to the investigation, a lower burden than required in ordinary criminal investigations. That is justified because the goal is to prevent a terrorist attack, not solve a crime that has already taken place, the court said, affirming the government's position.

Former US Senator Praises Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden (left) and
Gordon Humphries (right)
(Images: usnews.com)

An avalanche of media stories have worked overtime to convince readers that Edward Snowden's actions were just a step away from joining Lee Harvey Oswald's on American history's list of dark deeds. A step in a different direction appeared today, courtesy of the Associated Press. An AP story, posted in today's philly.com, reported that former US senator Gordon Humphrey wrote Snowden an e-mail supporting what the solon characterized as whistleblowing.

Humphrey hails from the "Live Free or Die" state of New Hampshire. A card carrying member of the Republican Party, Humphrey was a two-term senator and was never, ever implicated in anything that might have jeopardized American national security.

Well, there's always a first time.

Facebook Opens Server Farm in Sweden

Facebook's server farm in Sweden
(photo: facebook.com)

With an exquisitely ironic sense of timing, Facebook today began processing data from a new server farm outside the United States. The opening comes on the heels of Facebook's first public meeting for its equity shareholders, and revelations suggesting Facebook cooperated in the American security state's data sweeps. (How many "likes" did the NSA get today, eh?)

According to a story in siliconvalley.com, Facebook's Swedish server farm is located on the edge of the Arctic Circle. Mark Zuckerberg's version of Green Acres happens to be near major hydroelectric dams, an essential need for energy-hungry servers. Sweden's northern reaches also happen to be chilly, and high performance servers require constant, cool temperatures to run at maximum efficiency.

The siliconvalley.com piece noted some Swedes questioning their Facebook data's privacy. European laws tend to be far more restrictive than American regulations regarding data privacy. The Swedes may have reason to worry. One critic claimed that the data Facebook collects in Sweden is "mirrored" on US-based servers. Thanks to Edward Snowden, we have a more definitive sense of just how private American data is.

Eyes Wide Shut for "Five Eyes" Intelligence Alliance

Edward Snowden
(photo: csmonitor.com)

Edward Snowden's revelations about the depth and breadth of American electronic intelligence gathering did result, among many other things, in light being shed on something called "Five Eyes."

The name is not wacky spook code for a Jason Bourne-style escapade. Instead, it refers to a quintet of Anglo-Saxon nations who share intelligence. Those countries and their respective spy services represent, according to a Financial Times piece, "the hidden core of the western alliance."

The FT article notes that the Five Eyes "global system tracks everyone and everything...Geographically diverse, the five countries have built the kind of deep institutional links and technical capabilities that China can only dream about."

The Five Eyes membership did not desire any light shone on their activities. Their preference was for those they presumably protect and serve to, in Stanley Kubrick's phrase, keep their "eyes wide shut." Snowden's actions helped the blind see. Whether or not they liked what they saw was quite another question.