From Sen. Rockefeller's statement on 12/19: "The limited members who were told of the program were prohibited by
Tangentially-related article about judge approving cell phone monitoring without requiring prosecutors to show evidence of probable cause: http://news.com.com/Police+blotter+Judge+lets+Feds+track+cell+phones/2100-10... 8_3-6006453.html How extensive is NSA's spy program: http://news.com.com/Just+how+extensive+is+NSAs+spy+program/2100-1028_3-60063... 6.html An earlier roundup of blog posts: http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2005/12/nsa_surveillanc.html Articles asking whether President Bush commited an impeachable offense: http://www.cnsnews.com/news/viewstory.asp?Page=%5CPolitics%5Carchive%5C20051... %5CPOL20051220a.html http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/12/24/MNGBOGD4FF1.DTL http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,179323,00.html Previous Politech message: http://www.politechbot.com/2005/12/20/transcript-of-briefing/ http://www.politechbot.com/2005/12/20/two-submissions-on/ http://www.politechbot.com/2005/12/21/democrats-scramble-to/ -Declan -------- Original Message -------- Subject: HAVE YOU SEEN THIS? NY Times on NSA data mining Date: Sat, 24 Dec 2005 00:27:35 -0800 From: Philip Merrill <veyr@earthlink.net> To: Fred von Lohmann EFF <fred@eff.org>, Cory Doctorow <cory@eff.org>, Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> Fred, Cory, Declan, http://nytimes.com/2005/12/24/politics/24spy.html Spy Agency Mined Vast Data Trove, Officials Report By ERIC LICHTBLAU and JAMES RISEN Published: December 24, 2005 ... A former technology manager at a major telecommunications company said that since the Sept. 11 attacks, the leading companies in the industry have been storing information on calling patterns and giving it to the federal government to aid in tracking possible terrorists. "All that data is mined with the cooperation of the government and shared with them, and since 9/11, there's been much more active involvement in that area," said the former manager, a telecommunications expert who did not want his name or that of his former company used because of concern about revealing trade secrets. Such information often proves just as valuable to the government as eavesdropping on the calls themselves, the former manager said. "If they get content, that's useful to them too, but the real plum is going to be the transaction data and the traffic analysis," he said. "Massive amounts of traffic analysis information - who is calling whom, who is in Osama Bin Laden's circle of family and friends - is used to identify lines of communication that are then given closer scrutiny." ... Phil Karn, a computer engineer and technology expert at a major West Coast telecommunications company, said access to such switches would be significant. "If the government is gaining access to the switches like this, what you're really talking about is the capability of an enormous vacuum operation to sweep up data," he said. [BY THE WAY guys, here is an e-mail I just sent about this: "This is truly interesting and not surprising from a technical point of view. As someone who looks at how ISPs are treated, it explains things I already knew. In terms of any positive potential for the future, it just shows what a different world we are now living in that this is even possible. My MUSIC bias is to try to figure out how musicians can get paid based on today's technology. Puts the attached-below news article in a different light."] -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Reliability of information from telephone wiretaps Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 10:09:48 -0800 From: Alan Barclay <barclay@rtda.com> Organization: Runtime Design Automation To: declan@well.com CC: bankston@eff.org Hello Declan:- I came across a very interesting paper on wiretap evasion by Matt Blaze (UPenn) at the following URL. http://www.doxpara.com/?q=node&from=0 I particularly think that the legal implications on the reliability of information obtained by phone wiretaps may be far-reaching, and of interest to Politech readers. Especially given the current administration's demonstrated record of vindictiveness, I agree with Dan's conjecture about Matt's cojones. News article (incorrectly attributed to NY Times in above): http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/11/30/business/taps.php Summary of paper: http://www.crypto.com/papers/wiretapping/ Full paper http://www.crypto.com/papers/wiretap.pdf Best wishes for the holiday season and for the New Year. Thanks again for running Politech. Regards, Alan Barclay -- --Alan Barclay-- barclay@rtda.com (408) 492-0942 direct www.rtda.com (408) 492-0940 main -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [Politech] Democrats scramble to say they didn't tacitly approve Bush's NSA surveillance [priv] Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 12:21:27 -0800 From: Benjamin SMITH <b3smith@mac.com> To: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> References: <43A99CEB.4010509@well.com> Uh, Declan, the handful of Congresspeople who were even able to see the Administration's plans with the NSA were barred from discussing it even with their staffs, and others (like Senator Graham of FL) said that the briefings were much less informative than what was revealed in Friday's article in the NYT. Cherry-picked information, limited access... wait a minute, that sounds familiar... -b3n -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [Politech] Democrats scramble to say they didn't tacitly approve Bush's NSA surveillance [priv] Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 14:33:06 -0500 From: Eric Gasior <eric@tastysnackcracker.com> To: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> References: <43A99CEB.4010509@well.com> Declan, In fairness it should be pointed out that the briefings were classified therefore the ability of Rockefeller and Pelosi to inform others was limited. the Administration from sharing any information about it with our colleagues, including other members of the Intelligence Committees." http://rockefeller.senate.gov/news/2005/pr121905a.html Eric Gasior "First of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance." -- Franklin D. Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address, Mar. 4, 1933 -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [Politech] One more submission on Bush authorizing secret surveillance Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 16:02:18 EST From: MarkKernes@aol.com To: declan@well.com http://www.avn.com/index.php?Primary_Navigation=Articles&Action=View_Article& Content_ID=251800 News Analysis: Why You Should Be Worried About Bush's Illegal Wiretaps By Mark Kernes 12-19-2005 WASHINGTON, D.C. ? In his annual end-of-the-year speech delivered on Saturday, President Bush admitted to having committed at least 30 federal crimes by having issued an executive order authorizing the National Security Agency to intercept the international communications of people, including U.S. citizens (known in the law as "United States persons"), with known links to Al Qaeda and related terrorist organizations, and renewing that order, according to one report, more than 36 times. Each renewal could be considered by a court to constitute a separate crime. [snip] Mark Kernes, AVN "Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to have them repeated for them." ? Me -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [Politech] Two submissions on Bush authorizing secret surveillance by National Security Agency [priv] Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 23:38:20 -0500 (EST) From: Dean Anderson <dean@av8.com> To: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> CC: politech@politechbot.com FYI, its my read of the news on this issue the Whitehouse is claiming that the authorization to 'use any and all means appropriate to fight terrorism' supercedes the FISA and all other laws governing wiretapping, and indeed, I think they interpret it to be authorization to supercede all other laws governing anything else as well. This interpretation, if actually the position of the Whitehouse, is far more disturbing than tapping Americans talking/emailing foriegners internationally. In the case of tapping international calls and emails, there is ambiguity as to whether FISA applies anyway. In 1978, tapping was done on wires. It had to be done on the caller or the called. That is, in the US or outside the US. Suppose we tapped Osama's phone, physically in Afghanistan, and an American contact was made, FISA wouldn't apply. However, if we tapped the American (or more likely, a foriegner) physically in the US, hopping a contact would be made, FISA would apply. But modern surveillance is done differently because telecom is also different, now. In the case of modern international call, the tapping is probably done from space, using a satellite, or an undersea cable. And modern tapping can essentially scan all calls/emails for keywords. FISA covers surveillance done in the US. If the surveillance is done outside the US then FISA doesn't apply. Arguably, these interceptions might occur outside the US. But---I don't think this argument has been raised in this case. Rather, the Whitehouse seems to be claiming that it has congressional authorization for carte blanch superceding all prior laws incluing FISA. --Dean _______________________________________________ Politech mailing list Archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ Moderated by Declan McCullagh (http://www.mccullagh.org/) ----- End forwarded message ----- -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE [demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type application/pgp-signature which had a name of signature.asc]