Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 1824
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@ prunes
[Read the article: Comey's testimony raises new and vital questions about the NSA scandal]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Another good Kubrick movie about the psycho backline-warrior mentality is "Paths of Glory", where a politically ambitious general orders an impossible mission of certain death. He calls dissenters traitors and cowards, and cannot understand the motivations of the honest protagonist. When the suicide mission fails, he blames everyone but himself, to the degree that he attempts to execute 100 men from the battalion for cowardice.
Indeed. My favourite Kubrick (followed closely by DSOHILTSWALTB). It's Dubya's life, to a "T". Gee, wonder why we have a new "War Czar"? "Take the heat, and there's a Preznitdential Medal of Freedom in there for ya, along with another star for your uniform."
Cheers,
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@ ondolette
[Read the article: More fallout from the Comey revelations]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Don't know. But the circuitry installed sounds like it was for routing to other peers, not for routing into the room. The Narus in the room could easily have been a prototype or a version 1.0. If you think you can't get permission or get around public outcry why wouldn't you have set up a camp X-ray version? The fact that they eventually did (RAHS) makes it seem plausible.
They're probably just splitters on OC3/4/5 links. Not new technology, e.g:
http://www.eunice-forum.org/eunice99/010.pdf
You can tap any link you want, and what you see depends on what you tap.
I don't know what the bandwidth/filtering capacity is of the Narus STA640. The important thing is that the Narus is capable of more -- uhhh, "flexible" filtering -- than standard CALEA equipment, and that it's under control of the NSA and not the telco legal department.
Cheers,
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McConnell is (purposefully?) vague....
[Read the article: The administration's FISA falsehoods continue unabated]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]... in specifcying what he wants in terms of update.
This paragraph:
"In a significant number of cases, our intelligence agencies must obtain a court order to monitor the communications of foreigners suspected of terrorist activity who are physically located in foreign countries."
might be true in one limited circumstance (and I don't know whether that is in fact a significant obstacle right now):
If the intercept is physically done within the United States:
50 USC § 1801(f):
(2) the acquisition by an electronic, mechanical, or other surveillance device of the contents of any wire communication to or from a person in the United States, without the consent of any party thereto, if such acquisition occurs in the United States, but does not include the acquisition of those communications of computer trespassers that would be permissible under section 2511 (2)(i) of title 18;
If so, then repeal of 50 USC § 1801(f)(2) might be reasonable (I wouldn't argue against it; I see no reason why the physical location of the interception should make a difference; the "who" and "why" of the target would seem to be more dispositive as to whether an intercept should be allowed). But then again, that's why we set up shop in Menwith Hill too; so we could spy without this restriction.....
But McConnell doesn't say what changes he would like. If it's something besides this, then his claim above as to restrictions is simply wrong; we can spy on any foreigner outside the U.S. without a warrant or even a FISA court order (if we can manage to do so technically).
Cheers,
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@ scareduck
[Read the article: The administration's FISA falsehoods continue unabated]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I have said before and been twitted for suggesting that this sort of behavior was enabled by CALEA, which demanded centralized wiretapping capability. Is there anyone out there who can explain, besides with some dismissive, partisan handwave, why I should believe that the fruits of this Clinton-era law is not being used for this end?
Actually, in the U.S., the wiretapping capability under CALEA is not centralized (I have some experience in this). Every carrier has their own equipment (or purchase capacity from some service bureau) and is responsible for instituting the warrants themselves. When the gummint wants a tap on a person, they have t go to each carrier individually -- that the person uses or might be using -- to get it put in. This is unlike other countries, where the LEAs themselves control the wiretap provisioning and institute the taps themselves.
My major complaint with CALEA is the elision of call content (voice) and call data (signalling). Content taps require Title III warrants, but call data can be gotten with a less difficult-to-obtain trap&trace/pen-register court order. But in the digital world, the difference between "content" and "data" is getting blurred, and the FBI got such things as "dialed digit extraction" put into the latest (May 14th) punch-list, with such being treated as "call data".
Cheers,
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@ ondolette
[Read the article: The administration's FISA falsehoods continue unabated]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The paragraph you cited will be deleted if the changes go through.
Also, the proposed changes are not just for electronic surveillance, but also for physical searches. And your status changes if you can be labeled as an agent of a foreign power, they want to change the definition of agent of a foreign power to anyone who "is reasonably expected to possess, control, transmit, or receive foreign intelligence information while such person is in the United States".
The latter changes you mention, as I think I indicated, are the types that I think are pernicious. Those I oppose. Thanks for the info (here and in your prior post). And I am even more opposed to any elimination of the warrant/CO requirement, either explicitly, or implicitly by just writing stuff out of FISA as the above clause does by redefinition. I'm a firm fan of the Fourth Amendment.
Cheers,