By SPIEGEL Staff: “…Software giant Microsoft, which acquired Skype in 2011, said in a statement: “We will not provide governments with direct or unfettered access to customer data or encryption keys.” The NSA had been monitoring Skype even before that, but since February 2011, the service has been under order from the secret US Foreign… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: Patriot Act
Irish Government Joins Microsoft Against US Govt Access to Cloud Based Servers
The Register: “The Irish government today supported Microsoft in its ongoing fight against US prosecutors – who appear to want access to server hard drives anywhere in the world. Microsoft has garnered serious backing from the technology industry in its case against American investigators. The Feds believe they have the right to access emails stored on… Continue Reading
Congress Tells DoD to Report on Leaks
Secrecy News – Steven Aftergood: For the next two years, Congress wants to receive quarterly reports from the Department of Defense on how the Pentagon is responding to leaks of classified information. The reporting requirement was included in the pending National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2015 (Sec. 1052). “Compromises of classified information cause indiscriminate and… Continue Reading
Investigative Report Claims NSA Hacking of Cellphone Networks Is Global
Ryan Gallagher – The Intercept: “The AURORAGOLD operation is carried out by specialist NSA surveillance units whose existence has not been publicly disclosed: the Wireless Portfolio Management Office, which defines and carries out the NSA’s strategy for exploiting wireless communications, and the Target Technology Trends Center, which monitors the development of new communication technology to ensure… Continue Reading
Safeguarding the Personal Information of all People – ODNI
Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) – Safeguarding the Personal Information of all People, July 2014. “As the President said in his speech on January 17, 2014, “the challenges posed by threats like terrorism, proliferation, and cyber-attacks are not going away any time soon, and for our intelligence community to be effective over the… Continue Reading
Twitter – Taking the fight for #transparency to court
Twitter news release: ” As part of our latest transparency report released in July, wedescribed how we were being prohibited from reporting on the actual scope of surveillance of Twitter users by the U.S. government. Our ability to speak has been restricted by laws that prohibit and even criminalize a service provider like us from disclosing… Continue Reading
Retired NSA Technical Director Explains Snowden Docs
Alexa O’Brien – Based on a work at alexaobrien.com – “I had an opportunity to attend a presentation by a retired technical director at the NSA, William Binney, which provided context for some of the published documents released by former NSA contractor, Edward Snowden. Because of the public value of Binney’s expertise on the subject, I decided to publish his presentation… Continue Reading
Appeals Court Limits Military Surveillance of Civilian Internet Use
“The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in United States v. Dreyer that an agent for the Naval Criminal Investigative Service violated Defense Department regulations and the Posse Comitatus Act when he conducted a surveillance operation in Washington state to identify civilians who might be sharing illegal files. The 1878 Act prevents the U.S.… Continue Reading
The Evolution of US Government Restrictions on Using and Exporting Encryption Technologies
CIA approved for release 9/12/2014 – redacted: The Evolution of US Government Restrictions on Using and Exporting Encryption Technologies, Michael Schwartzbeck. “In the last year, several academic, commercial, and free speech advocates have seriously jeopardized the US government’s legal right to control encryption.” Continue Reading
FBI Says Biometric Database has Reached “Full Operational Capability”
“The FBI announced that the Next Generation Identification system, one of the largest biometric databases in the world, has reached “full operational capability.” In 2013, EPIC filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit about the NGI program. EPIC obtained documents that revealed an acceptance of a 20% error rate in facial recognition searches. Earlier this year, EPIC joined a coalition of… Continue Reading
Treasure Map: The NSA Breach of Telekom and Other German Firms
Spiegel Online – Andy Müller-Maguhn, Laura Poitras, Marcel Rosenbach and Michael Sontheimer: [Treaure Map] “is the mandate for a massive raid on the digital world. It aims to map the Internet, and not just the large traffic channels, such as telecommunications cables. It also seeks to identify the devices across which our data flows, so-called routers. Furthermore, every single end… Continue Reading
EPIC (Finally) Obtains Memos on Warrantless Wiretapping Program
“More than eight years after filing a Freedom of Information Act request for the legal justification behind the “Warrantless Wiretapping” program of President Bush, EPIC has now obtained a mostly unredacted version of two key memos (OLC54)and (OLC85) by former Justice Department official Jack Goldsmith. EPIC requested these memos just four hours after the New York Times broke the story about the… Continue Reading
