For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country — to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others.
The three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the NSA, which launched the program in 2001 shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the sources said. The program is aimed at identifying and tracking suspected terrorists, they said.
The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA program is secret.
Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, nominated Monday by President Bush to become the director of the CIA, headed the NSA from March 1999 to April 2005. In that post, Hayden would have overseen the agency's domestic call-tracking program. Hayden declined to comment about the program...
Full article: USA Today Story at http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-10-nsa_x.htm
[Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on May 11, 2006]
Note: http://www.usatoday.com...
NSA: Largest Database In History
Posted on Thursday, May 11 at 11:48 by PatmContributed By
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RickW
"Attack in Canada 'now probable': CSIS report"<p>---<br>RickW
Whole buildings full of files on millions of people, wire tapping, letter opening equipment, torture chambers, etc. How horrible it was that them there dastardly commies were spying on their own peoples and collecting evidence on the chance of prosecuting them for their thoughts as "enemies of the people".
Of course it couldn't have happened in our "free enterprise, democratic" society and won't happen again "now that the people of the Soviet Bloc have chosen capitalism over communism".
Of course, those unfortunate people have not chosen any such thing. Those regimes collapsed because they ran out of lies keeping their totally corrupt system going, just as the present "market economic capitalist" regimes are running out of lies to keep their criminal, thieving system alive.
With my blurb all over the Net, I'm sure there must be quite a thick file on me by now, because everything we write on these blogs, and lists, is duly recorded. This is why I insist on signing my name and address. Screw them !
Ed Deak, Big Lake. BC.
I'm with you on this, Ed. Let 'em come and get me.
Paul Richard Harris
The Hamlet of Carlisle
RR 3 Denfield
Ontario
telephone tracking program which could include Canada. It states that
the U.S. Congress knew about their domestic phone tracking, but also
knew and approved of U.S. authorities listening in or reading
"international telephone calls and e.mail communications ..." That
includes Canada.
It also includes 3 co-operating corporations, one of which in the U.S. is
Bell South ... which is undoubtedly on collegial terms with Bell Canada.
I don't like this one bit. We could all write to our Minister of Public
Safety ... the Honourable ... OMG ... Stockwell Day!
<br />
ECHELON: America's Spy in the Sky<br />
Patrick S. Poole<br />
<br />
Imagine what reaction the American public would have if they were suddenly to discover that a top-secret government intelligence agency was listening to virtually every phone conversation and reading almost every email and fax transmitted across the world each day, including their own. Now imagine how our European allies would react if they found out that this enormous intelligence gathering effort was particularly focused upon them by that same US intelligence agency. Think they'd be upset? Well, such as system exists, and in fact they are rather upset.<br />
<br />
ECHELON : Every American interacts with this system on a daily basis, and yet virtually no one on this side of the Atlantic is aware of its existence. ECHELON is actually a computer component to a global spy system controlled by the National Security Agency (NSA) and shared with the GCHQ of England, the CSE of Canada, the Australian DSD, and the GCSB of New Zealand. These organizations are bound together under a secret 1948 agreement, UKUSA, whose terms and text remain under wraps even today.<br />
<br />
But European diplomats are tearing the shroud of secrecy, tired of snooping by the US on their citizens. The use of ECHELON against European citizens was a central topic in a European Parliament STOA report published this past January, "Technologies of Political Control," which confirmed a decades worth of reports by several determined journalists about global spying by the NSA.<br />
<br />
This global spy system itself is fairly simple in design: position communications receiving stations all over the world to capture all satellite, microwave, cellular and fiber-optic traffic, and then process this information through the massive computer capabilities of the NSA, including voice recognition and OCR technology, and look for code words or phrases (known as the ECHELON "dictionaries"). Intelligence analysts at each of the respective "listening stations" analyze any conversation or document flagged by the system and forward any relevant information back to NSA headquarters at Fort Meade, Maryland.<br />
<br />
The vast majority of information gathered by this system passes through without notice to the intelligence agencies. But should you mention the word "bomb" in a phone conversation, you can be assured that some intelligence analyst will be reviewing the transcript of your conversation to ensure that you are not engaged in a terrorist plot.<br />
<br />
Now you may wonder how it is that the NSA can conduct spying within US borders in violation of its charter barring domestic surveillance. This is where UKUSA works to their advantage. The two primary listening stations at Sugar Grove, West Virginia and Yakima, Washington are manned by "on loan" intelligence officials from the one of the cooperating agencies. If they uncover information regarding a US citizen, they walk across the hall and give the information to the NSA liaison officer, effectively circumventing the domestic surveillance prohibition.<br />
<br />
At this point you're probably thinking that I've read one too many issues of the Black Helicopter Gazette or the Branch Davidian Times, however, my sources come from such "covert" sources as the London Times, the New York Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, La Monde and the BBC. Much of the recent press coverage has focused on the growing European outrage at the use of ECHELON and the British participation in the UKUSA intelligence arrangement.<br />
<br />
A May 31st article by Nicholas Rufford in the Sunday (London) Times quoted several officials from the German, French and Italian intelligence agencies decrying the expansion of the NSA facility on the windswept North Yorkshire moors of Menwith Hill, England (Field Station F83). Menwith Hill is the largest spy station in the world, and operated exclusively by the NSA. It monitors all communications traffic crossing the Atlantic and the European continent.<br />
<br />
Last September in a trial of two Menwith Hill trespassers, British Telecomm inadvertently released top secret documents to defense attorneys which confirmed that the three main digital optical fiber cables for the British Isles - each carrying 100,000 calls each at any time - run through the Menwith Hill facility to ease spying against Anglo citizens. Judge Jonathan Crabtree immediately lambasted the phone company, stating "BT had no business whatsoever to disclose anything of the kind. The national interest of the United Kingdom, even if it is conducted dishonestly, requires this to be kept a secret."<br />
<br />
ECHELON was designed during the heated days of the Cold War to combat the Soviet Union's creep into Western Europe - a noble cause indeed. During that time, however, the Watergate scandal uncovered that US law enforcement and intelligence agencies were targeting US citizens for surveillance based on their political affiliations. In hearings held in 1975, Senator Frank Church cautioned against the technological power of the NSA, and we should heed his warning today:<br />
<br />
"That capability at any time could be turned around on the American people and no America would have any privacy left. There would be no place to hide. If this government ever became a tyranny, the technological capacity that the intelligence community has given the government could enable it to impose total tyranny. There would be no way to fight back, because the most careful effort to combine together in resistance to the government, no matter how privately it was done, is within the reach of the government to know. Such is the capacity of this technology."<br />
<br />
It is truly a difficult thing to admit that America - land of the free and home of the brave - may be behind the largest surveillance effort in the history of mankind. If we should become as outraged as the Europeans about the use of the NSA's vast technological resources against US citizens, one could rightly ask what we could actually do about it. Sadly, the answer may be - not much. As Lord Acton's dictum goes, "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely." As power goes, it does not get any more absolute than ECHELON.<br />
<br />
If you think that I'm smoking a little too much strange tobacco, I would encourage you to visit this site that has links to reprints of many of the mainstream European press articles and the European Parliament STOA report that discuss ECHELON: <a href="http://www.qainfo.se/~lb/echelon.htm">http://www.qainfo.se/~lb/echelon.htm</a>.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=02/10/24/6633291">http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=02/10/24/6633291</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/frostspy.htm">http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/frostspy.htm</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.efc.ca/pages/media/ottawa.citizen.24may99.html">http://www.efc.ca/pages/media/ottawa.citizen.24may99.html</a><br />
<p>---<br>The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.... : Albert Einstein
For example: If the discussion revolves about searching for something but can't find it, just say "I bombed out".
The beauty is that one can let their imagination run wild while having fun at NSA's expense. Just imagine the system overload if 50% of ALL messages, be it phone, fax, email, etc. had to be manually examined because NSA key words were innocently implanted.
The mind boggles!
H.F. Wolff
<br />
<a href="http://www.eskimo.com/~joelm/tempestintro.html">http://www.eskimo.com/~joelm/tempestintro.html</a><br />
The Complete, Unofficial<br />
TEMPEST Information Page<br />
<br />
This page is about surveillance technology. If a search engine mistakenly led you here, try Shakespeare, Pontiacs, or Arcade Games. <br />
Introduction to TEMPEST<br />
<br />
What is TEMPEST? <br />
TEMPEST History <br />
Just how prevalent is emanation monitoring? <br />
TEMPEST Urban Folklore <br />
General TEMPEST Information <br />
EMSEC <br />
HIJACK and NONSTOP <br />
Online Sources <br />
Patents <br />
Paper Sources <br />
Monitoring Devices <br />
Do It Yourself Shielding Sources <br />
<a href="http://www.rense.com/general71/werr.htm">http://www.rense.com/general71/werr.htm</a><br />
<br />
What Fourth Amendment? <br />
We're In Bushworld Now <br />
By Dave Lindorff<br />
5-12-6<br />
<br />
I called my phone service provider, Verizon, Friday, to find out whether my phone records had been or were still being provided to the National Security Agency. Of course, I knew they were, since the report in USA Today on May 11 stated that Verizon, AT&T and BellSouth had all turned over all their customer records to the NSA, with only Qwest, of the major phone providers, refusing the request. <br />
<br />
The first thing I discovered was that when I called Verizon customer service, a misleadingly comforting recording had been added, saying, "As always, privacy of your account is your right and our duty." <br />
<br />
After that effort to head me off, I was switched to a customer service representative, who, upon learning that I was calling not with a billing question, but to see if my records had been given to the government, advised me that all such calls were being handled by the phone company's "Security Department." <br />
<br />
Switched to the Security Department, I got a recorded message saying that "all representatives are busy," instructing me to leave my number, and promising me that I would be called back. <br />
<br />
Uh-huh. <br />
<br />
It would appear that the public is truly upset, finally, at the news that the Bush administration has authorized massive "data mining" of phone records, once considered to be private absent a court order and a finding of probable cause. <br />
<br />
Now let me say that I know all about these phone company "Security Departments" (a misnomer if ever there was one!). In fact, my first ever investigative reporting scoop was a story I broke in my own weekly paper, the Los Angeles Vanguard, back in May 1976. That was an article exposing how the "Security Departments" of Pacific Telephone and GTE were both routinely giving out unlisted numbers, as well as customer credit records and other phone records, to a list of some 200 public agencies, ranging from federal, state and local police to the local library late books desk, all without any request for a warrant<a href="http://www.rense.com/general71/werr.htm">http://www.rense.com/general71/werr.htm</a><p>---<br>The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.... : Albert Einstein
Good on ya Qwest!
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RickW
OK, let's take a look at the actual reality of it to gain a bit of perspective shall we? It is estimated that in North America alone there are over one billion telephone calls made on a DAILY basis. That's billion with a "B". Now, do you honestly believe that on a daily basis someone is sitting there with headphones listening to one billion telephone calls per day??!!
I'm fascinated not only by the paranoia, but by the sense of self-importance and ego that some of the contributors to this site exhibit when they believe that their phone calls, or they're writings, are so important that anybody would even care what they said, or where they lived.
It's amazing how a small group that perpetually self-congratulates itself on it's keen awareness of the inner-workings of a non-existent oligarchical conspiracy completely miss the subtleties of effective propaganda when it rears up and slaps them in the face. The most effective psychological warfare against an opponent can often involve a black-eye for the defenders.
The sheer logistics of monitoring over one billion telephone calls per day make it a physical impossibility. But a very clear message has been sent to any domestic terrorist cells in North America: They're monitoring your phone calls. Everything else is just worthless static.
But SERIOUSLY, it is so frustrating to want to go to someone that could make a difference or help you with your concerns but everytime I want to email someone like that in our government I realize just how scary it has become living in Canada with these individuals in government. If I email with my concerns I'll be listed as a terrrosit by the very people that should by all accounts be concerned about the same things I am. Uneffinbelievable.
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"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music." Friedrich Nietzsche
I agree with you about the billions being impossible with a body and a headset. I'm sure there are other means and ways they could do it but I would then suggest that they would be snagging many innocent people and possibly nailing them with terrorist acts or thoughts that could land them in jail on security certificates or deported to countries for rendition. So paranoia aside and propaganda galore there is still reason to take the government and the phone providers to task over this. What do you suggest? Ignore it until....when?
I saw two senators on PBS "The Jim Lehrer report" on Friday and the Republican one was stating that everytime the media or anyone talked about this matter the national seurity was in jeopardy! Like this kind of behaviour was not jeopardizing the kind of free country the USA used to be? No amount of terrorist activity justifies what has been going on in terms of peoples privacy, and freedoms in the world since the infamous 9/11. If you choose to ignore it that's fine you'll be looked out for by the ones of us that do take these things seriously before they get out of control on us. And if you would prefer the world of Orwell to live in I'd rather you build yourself a playhouse and live it out in there.
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"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music." Friedrich Nietzsche