Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/verizon-providing-all-call-records-to-us-under-court-order/2013/06/05/98656606-ce47-11e2-8845-d970ccb04497_story.htmlQuoteThe National Security Agency appears to be collecting the telephone records of tens of millions of American customers of Verizon, one of the nation’s largest phone companies, under a top-secret court order issued in April.The order appears to require a Verizon subsidiary to provide the NSA with daily information on all telephone calls by its customers within the United States and from foreign locations into the United States.The order, which was signed by a judge from the secret court that oversees domestic surveillance, was first reported on the Web site of the Guardian newspaper. The Web site reproduced a copy of the order, which two former U.S. officials told The Washington Post appears to be authentic.A senior Obama administration official said Thursday that the purported order “does not allow the government to listen in on anyone’s telephone calls” but relates only to “metadata, such as a telephone number or the length of a call.” The official said such information “has been a critical tool in protecting the nation from terrorist threats to the United States.”An expert in this aspect of the law said Wednesday night that the order appears to be a routine renewal of a similar order first issued by the same court in 2006. The expert, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues, said that the order is reissued routinely every 90 days and that it is not related to any particular investigation by the FBI or any other agency.The order falls under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, which authorizes the government to make broad demands on telephone carriers for information about calls. In this case, the order requires Verizon to provide “ongoing, daily” information about “all call detail records . . . created by Verizon for communications between the United States and abroad; or wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls.”The FBI, which apparently sought the order, declined to comment. Spokesmen for Verizon and the court also declined to comment.The Center for Constitutional Rights, which has sued the government over its surveillance practices, said in a statement Wednesday night that the order “requires no level of suspicion and applies to all Verizon subscribers anywhere in the U.S. It also contains a gag order prohibiting Verizon from disclosing information about the order to anyone other than their counsel.”
UPDATE: Google, Facebook, Skype, Gmail, Microsoft and others also involved as early as 2007:Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/us-tech-giants-nsa-dataQuoteThe National Security Agency has obtained direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple and other US internet giants, according to a top secret document obtained by the Guardian.The NSA access is part of a previously undisclosed program called PRISM, which allows officials to collect material including search history, the content of emails, file transfers and live chats, the document says.The Guardian has verified the authenticity of the document, a 41-slide PowerPoint presentation – classified as top secret with no distribution to foreign allies – which was apparently used to train intelligence operatives on the capabilities of the program. The document claims "collection directly from the servers" of major US service providers.Although the presentation claims the program is run with the assistance of the companies, all those who responded to a Guardian request for comment on Thursday denied knowledge of any such program.In a statement, Google said: "Google cares deeply about the security of our users' data. We disclose user data to government in accordance with the law, and we review all such requests carefully. From time to time, people allege that we have created a government 'back door' into our systems, but Google does not have a back door for the government to access private user data."Several senior tech executives insisted that they had no knowledge of PRISM or of any similar scheme. They said they would never have been involved in such a program. "If they are doing this, they are doing it without our knowledge," one said. An Apple spokesman said it had "never heard" of PRISM.The NSA access was enabled by changes to US surveillance law introduced under President Bush and renewed under Obama in December 2012.The program facilitates extensive, in-depth surveillance on live communications and stored information. The law allows for the targeting of any customers of participating firms who live outside the US, or those Americans whose communications include people outside the US.It also opens the possibility of communications made entirely within the US being collected without warrants.Disclosure of the PRISM program follows a leak to the Guardian on Wednesday of a top-secret court order compelling telecoms provider Verizon to turn over the telephone records of millions of US customers.The participation of the internet companies in PRISM will add to the debate, ignited by the Verizon revelation, about the scale of surveillance by the intelligence services. Unlike the collection of those call records, this surveillance can include the content of communications and not just the metadata.Some of the world's largest internet brands are claimed to be part of the information-sharing program since its introduction in 2007. Microsoft – which is currently running an advertising campaign with the slogan "Your privacy is our priority" – was the first, with collection beginning in December 2007.It was followed by Yahoo in 2008; Google, Facebook and PalTalk in 2009; YouTube in 2010; Skype and AOL in 2011; and finally Apple, which joined the program in 2012. The program is continuing to expand, with other providers due to come online.Collectively, the companies cover the vast majority of online email, search, video and communications networks.When the FAA was first enacted, defenders of the statute argued that a significant check on abuse would be the NSA's inability to obtain electronic communications without the consent of the telecom and internet companies that control the data. But the PRISM program renders that consent unnecessary, as it allows the agency to directly and unilaterally seize the communications off the companies' servers.A chart prepared by the NSA, contained within the top-secret document obtained by the Guardian, underscores the breadth of the data it is able to obtain: email, video and voice chat, videos, photos, voice-over-IP (Skype, for example) chats, file transfers, social networking details, and more.The document also shows the FBI acts as an intermediary between other agencies and the tech companies, and stresses its reliance on the participation of US internet firms, claiming "access is 100% dependent on ISP provisioning".In the document, the NSA hails the PRISM program as "one of the most valuable, unique and productive accesses for NSA".It boasts of what it calls "strong growth" in its use of the PRISM program to obtain communications. The document highlights the number of obtained communications increased in 2012 by 248% for Skype – leading the notes to remark there was "exponential growth in Skype reporting; looks like the word is getting out about our capability against Skype". There was also a 131% increase in requests for Facebook data, and 63% for Google.The NSA document indicates that it is planning to add Dropbox as a PRISM provider. The agency also seeks, in its words, to "expand collection services from existing providers".Orwell is rolling in his grave right now
DNZRX768 said, June 07, 2013, 04:14:30 pmTop secret this, top secret that!Well, if we know of it now, it is not exactly top secret, right?You do know what a "leak" is right?
A leak is a way (usually an opening) for fluid to escape a container or fluid-containing system, such as a tank or a ship's hull, through which the contents of the container can escape or outside matter can enter the container. Leaks are usually unintended and therefore undesired.
Titiln said, June 07, 2013, 06:07:52 pmA leak is a way (usually an opening) for fluid to escape a container or fluid-containing system, such as a tank or a ship's hull, through which the contents of the container can escape or outside matter can enter the container. Leaks are usually unintended and therefore undesired.good, you had me worried for a minute, glad to see everythign is back to normal.
QuoteBREAKING: Obama says internet monitoring doesn't apply to US citizens or people living in the US.that's a relief!!!
DNZRX768 said, June 07, 2013, 04:14:30 pmTop secret this, top secret that!Well, if we know of it now, it is not exactly top secret, right?for someone that speaks openly about carrying weapons in order to protect yourself you are awfully misguided sometimes.It was top secret until people leaked their secrets, how can you not understand this?Cmon man! Google claims this to be false.http://boingboing.net/2013/06/08/prism-and-denials-whats-goi.html
UPDATE: Source of the Verizon and PRISM leaks steps forward, revealed to be former CIA employee.http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/10/us-usa-security-identity-idUSBRE9590BP20130610QuoteAn ex-CIA employee working as a contractor at the U.S. National Security Agency said he was the source who leaked details of a top secret U.S. surveillance program, acting out of conscience to protect "basic liberties for people around the world."Holed up in a hotel room in Hong Kong, Edward Snowden, 29, said he had thought long and hard before publicizing details of an NSA program code-named PRISM, saying he had done so because he felt the United States was building an unaccountable and secret espionage machine that spied on every American.His whereabouts were not immediately known on Monday, but staff at a luxury hotel in Hong Kong told Reuters that Snowden had checked out at noon.Snowden, a former technical assistant at the CIA, said he had been working at the super-secret NSA as an employee of contractor Booz Allen. He said he decided to leak information after becoming disenchanted with President Barack Obama, who he said had continued the policies of predecessor George W. Bush."I don't want to live in a society that does these sort of things ... I do not want to live in a world where everything I do and say is recorded. That is not something I am willing to support or live under," he told the Guardian newspaper, which published a video interview with him on its website. The interview was dated June 6.The CIA and the White House declined to comment, while a spokesman for the Director of National Intelligence would not comment directly about Snowden himself but said the intelligence community was reviewing damage done by the recent leaks."Any person who has a security clearance knows that he or she has an obligation to protect classified information and abide by the law," said the spokesman, Shawn Turner.The NSA has requested a criminal probe into the leaked information. On Sunday, the U.S. Justice Department said it was in the initial stages of a criminal investigation following the leaks.Booz Allen, a U.S. management and technology consultancy, said reports of the leaked information were "shocking and if accurate, this action represents a grave violation" of company policy.It said Snowden had been employed by the company for less than three months and that it would cooperate with any investigations. Posted: June 10, 2013, 06:53:37 pmUPDATE: Senators calling for review of the Patriot Act because of the reveal:http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/sns-rt-us-usa-security-lawmakersbre9580ab-20130609,0,711549.storyQuoteWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Lawmakers called on Sunday for a review of the government's monitoring of phone and Internet activities, and one Democrat urged a reopening of the Patriot Act, the post-September 11, 2001 law that gave intelligence agencies broader surveillance powers.As lawmakers debated the implications of the U.S. surveillance programs that were first reported in Britain's Guardian and The Washington Post, the Guardian identified a 29-year-old former CIA technical worker as the source of the leaks about the spy agencies.The Guardian said its source, Edward Snowden, had asked the newspaper to reveal his identity.The surveillance activity has stirred a debate over privacy rights in the United States.Senator Mark Udall, a member of the Intelligence Committee, said he thought another look at the 2001 U.S.A Patriot Act was warranted."I think we ought to reopen the Patriot Act and put some limits on the amount of data that the National Security (Agency) is collecting," Udall told the ABC program "This Week."He said there must be a balance between protecting the country against terrorist attacks and respecting Americans' constitutional rights, including the Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful search and seizure."It ought to remain sacred, and there's got to be a balance here. That is what I'm aiming for. Let's have the debate, let's be transparent, let's open this up," he said. "I don't think the American public knows the extent or knew the extent to which they were being surveilled and their data was being collected."Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, a potential 2016 presidential candidate, has been one of the most vocal critics of the surveillance. Paul told "Fox News Sunday" he would consider a legal challenge to the constitutionality of the mining of phone records."They are looking at a billion phone calls a day from what I read in the press and that doesn't sound to me like a modest invasion of privacy. It sounds like an extraordinary invasion of privacy," Paul said.[/quote
Some freakish human-orange hybrid just called Snowden a traitor and said that the leak puts Americans at risk, somehow.And charges are already being filed on Snowden, though he has since vanished.
