NSA Spying, Privacy and the Fourth Amendment: The Views of U.S. Presidential Candidates

What are the positions of U.S. presidential candidates on NSA domestic spying, personal privacy and the Fourth Amendment?

Putting the debate in perspective, we begin with the Snowden affair.

In May 2013, explosive details about the National Security Agency’s (NSA) surveillance programs were revealed in documents provided by Edward Snowden to journalists Glenn Greenwald and Barton Gellman, and documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras.

Investigators claim Snowden began downloading government documents in 2012 while working with Dell, an NSA contractor. In March, 2013 – three days after what he later called his “breaking point” of “seeing the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, directly lie under oath to Congress” – Snowden quit his job at Dell and began work for Booz Allen Hamilton where his downloading resumed.

Initial Snowden documents published in June 2013 by the Washington Post and The Guardian revealed the extent and expansive reach of the agency’s dragnet spy programs worldwide.

In the same month, the U.S. Department of Justice charged Snowden of two counts of violating the Espionage Act of 1917 and theft of US Government or foreign government property.

Documents estimated to range from 250 thousand to 1.7 million disclosed NSA’s collection of domestic email, telephone metadata and revealed a top secret data mining and information sharing program named PRISM.

Shock value was high leading calls for Congressional hearings and changes to the U.S. surveillance law. European reaction reached a zenith upon learning that the cell phone of Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, had been bugged. “Spying among friends” is unacceptable, she said.

Leaked documents published by Der Spiegel in 2014 appeared to show that the NSA had targeted 122 “high ranking” leaders.

Read more @ http://www.globalresearch.ca/nsa-spying-privacy-and-the-fourth-amendment-the-views-of-u-s-presidential-candidates/5510938

 

Such a nice person….. NOT.  I guess they don’t like it that they were sprung......  If anything Snowden is an honest patriot….. and definitely not narcissistic….. or even insufferably self-important.  He is doing what is right and just and needs to be done..... and he has given up his life to do it.

 

Edward Snowden is a 'naïve, narcissistic and insufferably self-important defector', claims former NSA boss

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/edward-snowden-naive-narcissistic-insufferably-self-important-defector-claims-former-nsa-1545685

 

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden says fixing U.S. is his first duty

MANCHESTER — Edward Snowden told a supportive, enthusiastic crowd at the New Hampshire Liberty Forum Saturday that he would return to the United States if the government guarantees him a fair trial, “where I can make a public interest defense of why this was done and allow the jury to decide if it was right or wrong.”

A big cheer went up as Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who stole secret government documents that exposed mass surveillance programs, first appeared on a big screen via a video link from Russia, where he is living in exile.

More than 400 people, most of them members of the Free State Project, crowded into a meeting room at the Radisson Center of New Hampshire to hear Snowden, who has attained folk-hero status among libertarians. Another 100 watched in another room.

Read more @ http://www.unionleader.com/NSA-whistleblower-Edward-Snowden-says-fixing-U.S.-is-his-first-duty

 

Italy summons US ambassador over reported NSA spying

Italy’s foreign ministry summoned U.S. Ambassador John Phillips on Tuesday after WikiLeaks released top-secret documents showing how Washington had spied on the Italian prime minister.

Foreign Minister Michele Valensise asked for “clarifications” about U.S. surveillance, the Italian ministry said in a statement.

The Italian government also alluded to changes that the Obama administration made in 2014, on the heels of damaging leaks from Edward Snowden, to prohibit personal spying on friendly foreign leaders.

In response, the American ambassador promised to “immediately” address Italy’s concerns, the foreign ministry claimed.

The WikiLeaks documents, which date back to 2010 and 2011, show that the National Security Agency (NSA) secretly monitored communications of top Italian officials.

One 2010 message appears to be based off intercepted discussions between then-Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu. The talks were focused on “smoothing out the current rift” between the U.S. and Israel, the message claimed.

“Berlusconi promised to put Italy at Israel's disposal in helping mend the latter's ties with Washington,” the NSA said in the message. 

In a second message, from 2011, the NSA appeared to have snooped on a top Berlusconi adviser’s account of a meeting the Italian prime minister had with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel about Italy’s financial health.

Read more @ http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/270495-italy-summons-us-ambassador-over-reported-nsa-spying

 

Rare glimpse at the secrets of Pine Gap spy base

Researchers have offered an up close look at Pine Gap, the humming military citadel in central Australia.

It's the top secret spy base almost everyone knows exists but very few people get to see.

Now, a group of determined researchers have offered an up-close look at Pine Gap, the humming military citadel in central Australia built to suck data from the skies.

By using zoom lens digital photography and plotting the position in orbit of spy satellites, the researchers have also for the first time documented what they believe to be the function of the dozens of dishes, radar domes and antennae that bristle across base.

The findings, released in a report by the Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainability and led by renowned Australian defence academic Des Ball, chart the expansion of Pine Gap from its Cold War origins to monitor nuclear threats to suspected key role in deadly drone warfare of today.

The report includes a series of photographs to be shown in an upcoming exhibition in Melbourne that offer a fascinating glimpse of the spy station jointly run by Australia and the United States.

One photo of the southern end of the base shows the most recent additions to the 19 "radomes" at Pine Gap - more than twice the number found at Pine Gap 30 years ago.

Read more @ http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/rare-glimpse-at-the-secrets-of-pine-gap-spy-base-20160226-gn51oa.html

 

Apple counters government demands as White House expands NSA data sharing

In a filing Thursday, US tech giant Apple laid out its case against a court order to bypass the security features of a phone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters. The company claims that its First Amendment rights are being violated and accuses the government of attempting to “conscript” the company into spying on the population, a move it called “unprecedented.”

While government officials have claimed that the court order is narrowly focused only on Syed Farook’s phone, in reality the case has been seized upon by the federal government to renew its offensive against encryption technology, which it views as an intolerable restraint on its spying powers. Even the San Bernardino police chief has admitted to the press that Farook’s iPhone, a work phone issued to him by the county, probably contains “nothing of any value.”

Read more @ https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016/02/27/appl-f27.html

 

Apple at war with US government, Donald Trump

Apple chief executive Tim Cook's refusal to help the FBI unlock an iPhone used by a terrorist has put the technology company on a collision cause with the White House and sparked a raucous debate over striking the balance between national security and personal privacy.

In an unprecedented ruling, a California judge ordered Apple to build new software to unlock an iPhone 5c used by terrorist Syed Rizwan Farook in the shooting spree with her husband that killed 14 people in San Bernardino in December.

The Obama administration and Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump sided with security authorities and the court on the spat.

"The Department of Justice and the FBI can rely on the full support of the White House as they conduct an investigation to learn as much as they can about this particular incident," President Barack Obama's spokesman Josh Earnest said on Wednesday in Washington.

Read more @ http://www.afr.com/technology/apple-at-war-with-us-government-donald-trump-20160217-gmx145

Crunch time for Apple as it prepares for face-off with FBI

What might happens at this week’s congressional hearing as the iPhone maker continues to defy last month’s court order over phone encryption?

On Tuesday, Apple will face one of the biggest corporate challenges in its history, when it tells a US House of Representatives committee why it has refused to help law enforcement officers break into the iPhone of Syed Farook – one of the gunmen in the San Bernardino shooting in December that left 14 dead and 22 wounded. The technology giant will be represented by its top lawyer, Bruce Sewell; making the case against it will be FBI boss James Comey.

Apple, the world’s most valuable private company, has come under fire from many in politics and law enforcement after refusing to comply with the 16 February court order.

Described by Apple chief executive Tim Cook as “chilling”, the order would require the company to disable some of the phone’s security measures so the government can find Farook’s passcode. Normally an iPhone’s operating system slows it down every time a wrong passcode is used, so that it is effectively impossible to break in by systematically trying all combinations.

Read more @ http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/feb/27/apple-fbi-congressional-hearing-iphone-encryption

 

EFF pushes forward with new amicus brief in case against NSA spying

At this point it almost feels like we've been living with the Edward Snowden revelations all of our lives. While what was revealed scared many people, it also led to a lot of legal battles that are still raging on. At the forefront of those is the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group that tirelessly fights for people's rights.

The foundation has had an ongoing case which has been termed Jewell v NSA, as well as Wikimedia v NSA. There are many irons in the fire in this battle and now the EFF has filed a new amicus brief in the Wikimedia case.

On Wednesday the organization filed the brief, which urges the court to allow the various parties to continue their pursuit of the NSA for what the EFF terms "illegal surveillance". This has been filed with the Fourth Circuit Court, which could prove favorable as it allowed Jewell v NSA to go forward after quite a bit of stalling by the government.

This case, brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, which represents nine plaintiffs, including Wikimedia, was rejected by a federal judge in Maryland. However the EFF hopes it can move forward on more favorable grounds. The court this was filed with has just recently ruled the Jewell case can continue, authorizing the EFF to begin discovery, which will compel the government to release documents pertaining to the spying.

"We’re well past the point where the government can simply utter 'national security' and get these cases dismissed at their outset", claims EFF Staff Attorney Mark Rumold. "We battled back these arguments in Jewel, and now we are asking another appeals court to do the same thing in Wikimedia".

Read more @ http://betanews.com/2016/02/26/eff-pushes-forward-with-new-amicus-brief-in-case-against-nsa-spying/

 

Obama to Trash Reagan’s Restrictions on Domestic Spying

With the pubic distracted by the FBI battling Apple for an iPhone backdoor, President Obama is secretly working to trash President Ronald Reagan’s restrictions on the number of federal agencies that can spy on Americans and others.

At a secret meeting of the United States National Security Council on Feb 25, President Obama approved a draft 21-page memo relaxing a Cold War Reagan-era directive called Executive Order 12333 that restricted the number of government agencies that can access, without court order or Presidential approval, the contents of phone calls, emails and data the U.S. National Security Agency vacuums up from around the world.

The new Obama memo would allow numerous federal agencies to share bulk data from satellites, foreign communications crossing U.S. network switches, messages acquired overseas, and data shared by American allies, according to the New York Times.

Sources indicate that the Obama administration initiative is being described as giving a number of U.S. government agencies direct access to the broad spectrum of electronic intercepts in the “hope that that they will recognize any possible nuggets of value.”

Read more @ http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/28/obama-to-trash-president-reagans-restrictions-on-domestic-spying/

 

What The Apple vs FBI Flap Is Really About [Hint: Edward Snowden]

Here’s what almost no one has been reporting. The Apple-FBI encryption flap is really all about Edward Snowden and the NSA, says Ted Rall.

The fight between Apple and the FBI has been framed as an epic battle between big tech and big government. Apple, says the Obama Administration, is siding with “its business model and public brand marketing strategy” ahead of public safety.

That’s not it, says Apple CEO Tim Cook. He says his company is “a staunch advocate for our customers’ privacy and personal safety.”

Donald Trump has weighed in on the controversy, ad-libbing a call for a boycott of Apple products including the iPhone, the device at the center of the debate.

The public side of the controversy began two weeks ago, when a federal court ordered Apple to write code that would allow the FBI to unlock an iPhone used by one of the gunmen in the San Bernadino mass shooting. Apple refused, saying the code could be used to unlock other iPhones, too, not just the one covered by the order. Though the FBI denied that, saying it just wanted to unlock the one gunman’s phone, a Wall Street Journal report that the feds are currently going after a dozen or so iPhones in other cases now seems to back up Apple’s argument.

Read more @ http://anewdomain.net/2016/02/28/why-the-apple-vs-fbi-flap-is-really-about-edward-snowden/

 

Experts say Apple showdown could speed development of 'government-proof' devices

The legal showdown between Apple Inc and US law enforcement over encryption, no matter the outcome, will likely accelerate tech company efforts to engineer safeguards against government intrusion, tech industry executives say.

Already, an emerging industry is marketing super-secure phones and mobile applications.

An Apple executive said the company will strengthen its encryption if it wins its court battle with the federal government, which last week secured a court order requiring Apple engineers to help extract data from a phone associated with the mass shootings in San Bernardino.

The executive spoke on condition of anonymity.

Read more @ http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2016/02/24/experts-say-apple-showdown-could-speed-development-government-proof-devices

 

The ’80s Classic ‘WarGames’ Apparently Set The Stage For NSA Spying

WarGames is an ’80s classic and, for many people, their first introduction to the concept of hacking. Matthew Broderick plays a hacker who thinks he’s found a fun war simulation, but is in fact talking to a NORAD supercomputer that controls the nukes, and nearly starts World War III. And believe it or not, it not only had a basis in reality, it set up how the government perceives, and deals with, cybersecurity.

Why? Because Ronald Reagan saw it and, in a Joint Chiefs meeting, asked chairman John Vessey to investigate whether it was Hollywood fantasy or if American military systems could really be compromised by an industrious kid or a Soviet initiative. Vessey came back with an answer a week later: Not only was it possible, it was in fact becoming increasingly probable.

In part, Vessey knew this because the United States was actively breaching the computer systems of the Soviet Union and other countries to gather intelligence, and there were very public instances of hackers cracking passwords and invading systems in the United States. And WarGames reflected the concerns of a group of computer scientists and intelligence officials worried about security, including, most importantly, Willis Ware.

Ware is a rarely discussed, but important part of computer and Internet history. Ware was the first to realize that as computers become more commonplace and more connected, security and privacy concerns we could only dream of would not only suddenly manifest, but cause massive and dramatic changes in social and government policy. Despite working on highly classified systems, Ware was publicly available for comment in his role at the RAND Corporation, so when a few screenwriters asked whether the urban legend that government computers were connected to public phone lines was real, Ware cheerfully confirmed that they were. He’d know, as he built NORAD’s system, including the open phone lines employees could call into to work on the weekends.

Read more @ http://uproxx.com/gammasquad/was-wargames-real/

 

United States sets out limits on its spying as part of new data pact with EU

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The United States has set out limits to its use of data collected in bulk about European citizens after a new information-sharing pact was agreed this month, according to documents seen by Reuters.

A clear explanation of what information could be used for -- preventing its "indiscriminate" and "arbitrary" use -- was a key condition of the new Privacy Shield framework that enables firms to easily transfer personal data to the United States.

Under the deal, Washington agreed to create a specific new role within the State Department to deal with complaints and enquiries forwarded by EU data protection agencies. There will also be an alternative dispute resolution mechanism to resolve grievances and a joint annual review of the accord.

In a letter to the U.S. Department of Commerce, Robert Litt, General Counsel of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, says data collected in bulk can only be used for six specific purposes, including counterterrorism or cybersecurity.

Crucially, U.S. authorities would apply the same safeguards against indiscriminate data collection to information being transmitted through transatlantic cables. That addresses a key European concern that information gathered outside the United States was afforded fewer protections.

Read more @ https://au.news.yahoo.com/technology/a/30945194/united-states-sets-out-limits-on-its-spying-as-part-of-new-data-pact-with-eu/

 

Edward Snowden's Vancouver talk to cover big data ... and human rights

Snowden will appear via live weblink for a discussion moderated by the CBC's Laura Lynch

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden will appear in Vancouver via live weblink for a keynote speech on technology and human rights.

The SFU-hosted event, Edward Snowden: Big Data, Security and Human Rights, will take place April 5 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

A panel discussion featuring experts from SFU and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association will be moderated by senior CBC correspondent and host, Laura Lynch.

Audience members will be able to pose questions during the discussion via Twitter.

Snowden is a controversial figure. Documents he leaked to the Guardian newspaper in 2013 revealed the U.S. government has programs in place to spy on almost everything that hundreds of millions of people do online, including emails, social networking posts, online chat histories, phone calls and texts.

Hailed by some as a civil rights hero, others condemn him as a traitor who compromised national security. He is wanted by the U.S. government on espionage charges.

Read more @ http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/edward-snowden-vancouver-sfu-1.3454096

 

The NSA spied on top-secret climate negotiations between world leaders

Climate negotiations between the world’s powerhouses usually take place behind closed doors — unless, that is, the U.S. government is secretly listening in.

A batch of documents released by WikiLeaks on Tuesday reveal that the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) spied on communications regarding international climate change agreements, including negotiations in 2008 between United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whom the NSA had reportedly been spying on for decades. The NSA listened in on a private meeting between the two leaders ahead of a 2009 conference in Copenhagen, and gleaned information about their hopes that the European Union play a major role in climate change mitigation, adding Merkel thought the “tough issue” would involve carbon trading.

An excerpt from one of the NSA memos reads:

Ban Ki-moon, in an exchange on 10 December with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, pointed out that the world would be watching the EU with “keen interest” for reassurances that it will maintain its leadership role in combating climate change … Ban also maintained that since the new U.S. administration will have a very engaging and proactive attitude on the issue, the time is right for the EU and the whole world to create conditions necessary for reaching a meaningful deal at the 2009 UN Climate Talks … Merkel believed that the climate-change issue should be discussed at the heads-of-state level, otherwise it would not work.

In a statement, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange accused “a country intent on protecting its largest oil companies” of bugging Ki-moon’s efforts to save the planet.

Read more @ http://grist.org/news/the-nsa-spied-on-top-secret-climate-negotiations-between-world-leaders/

 

Journalists Should Stand Up for Whistleblowers

This first appeared on OtherWords.

The Obama administration’s ongoing crusade against government whistleblowers — which culminated last year in the imprisonment of former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling — has reignited a debate over the role journalists should play in defending their profession and the sources and networks on which it depends.

Sterling’s serving a three-and-half-year prison term for a conviction built primarily on circumstantial evidence — a heavy sentence, though less than the draconian 24 years the government originally sought.

Sterling’s alleged crime was divulging a botched CIA operation to New York Times journalist James Risen.

While the Times and other news organizations fought for their own — hiring a team of lawyers to defend Risen against a government subpoena — they did much less to advocate for the rights of whistleblowers, or to denounce the severe punishment meted out to Sterling himself.

The case highlights the tension among journalists about their larger role in society. Do they merely hold up an objective window to the world, or should they advocate for the free flow of information and those who act as sources for their reporting?

Reporters could learn a lesson from free speech and privacy advocates. We see our work as an essential collaboration among “what,” “why,” and “how” people.

The “what” people are those who first identify a problem in society. They’re the whistleblowers — like former intelligence officer Edward Snowden, who alerted us to the alarming extent of mass government surveillance.

The “why” people investigate the roots of a problem. Journalist Glenn Greenwald and filmmaker Laura Poitras have devoted their careers to analyzing the rise of the surveillance state. It’s natural that a “what” person like Snowden would seek out Greenwald and Poitras to explain the threat of wholesale surveillance to a wider audience.

Read more @ http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/journalists_should_stand_up_for_whistleblowers_20160227 

 

Release of critical journalists blasted by pro-gov’t media

The release from prison of two leading figures at a critical daily after Turkey's top court ruled that their detentions violated their human rights has been greeted with caution by the government, while pro-government journalists attacked the verdict, claiming that it would lead to spying no longer being considered a crime.

The Cumhuriyet daily's Editor-in-Chief Can Dündar and its Ankara bureau chief Erdem Gül were set free from prison after midnight on Thursday after the İstanbul 14th High Criminal Court acted on the verdict of the Constitutional Court hours earlier and ordered their release. The decision marks the end of three months in prison for the pair since their joint arrest at the end of last November.

“The trial will continue [and] we will closely follow it,” İbrahim Kalın, presidential spokesperson, told reporters on Friday, noting that the release does not mean acquittal.

At a press conference at the presidential palace, Kalın drew a parallel between the trial of the two journalists with judicial investigations launched by the US against figures such as Edward Snowden for leaking confidential documents over Wikileaks.

Read more @ http://www.todayszaman.com/national_release-of-critical-journalists-blasted-by-pro-govt-media_413442.html


"What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us."  ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~