DoJ to Snowden: Hope your 15 minutes were worth it, pal

[Iormlund]

I believe you but that is a bit hard for me imagine as a possibility

Why?

Telcos already have DBs full of metadata. They need those to keep track of calls for billing purposes. It's just a matter of adding more fields to those DBs and forwarding them to proper government agency.

[crazy canuck]

Why?

Telcos already have DBs full of metadata. They need those to keep track of calls for billing purposes. It's just a matter of adding more fields to those DBs and forwarding them to proper government agency.

Recording every call is just a matter of adding a field to a spread sheet?

[Berkut]

WTB MOAR HYSTERIA

[Admiral Yi]

I suspect there might be some English as a second language confusion here (no offense intended).

When I (and I think the rest of the English speakers) read "record a phone call," i think a tape is made of the words spoken during the conversation.  Not just the database entry "at 2:34 PM, Admiral Yi made a call to Dominatrix Hotline."

[The Brain]

No I understand it so it's not a second language thing.

[Bluebook]

The intercept probes on the transatlantic cables gave GCHQ access to its special source exploitation. Tempora allowed the agency to set up internet buffers so it could not simply watch the data live but also store it – for three days in the case of content and 30 days for metadata.

[Bluebook]

What part of storing content did you not understand?

[Iormlund]

Why?

Telcos already have DBs full of metadata. They need those to keep track of calls for billing purposes. It's just a matter of adding more fields to those DBs and forwarding them to proper government agency.

Recording every call is just a matter of adding a field to a spread sheet?

They won't use Access to keep track of data, obviously.

But other than that yeah, that's pretty much it. The content of calls will already be encoded for transmission. You might have to run it through further algorithms for, say, compression. But that's not exactly new territory. Then stick the binary data on a table with the associated ID and that's it.

The limits will depend on hardware, which is what Snowden says is being improved constantly.

[Berkut]

I think the extent that the US Average Joe cares is a lot more related to the government listening to US phone calls.

Mostly I think we are all ok with the US listening to all your guys phone calls. If you don't want us listening, encrypt them or something. Spying is old news. Listening in on other countries phone calls has been done for as long as there have been telephones.

[The Minsky Moment]

The intercept probes on the transatlantic cables gave GCHQ access to its special source exploitation. Tempora allowed the agency to set up internet buffers so it could not simply watch the data live but also store it – for three days in the case of content and 30 days for metadata.

That is a statement of capability.
Question is how is that capability used. 

[The Minsky Moment]

I think the extent that the US Average Joe cares is a lot more related to the government listening to US phone calls.

Mostly I think we are all ok with the US listening to all your guys phone calls.

These are transatlantic cables, so a lot of it is going to capture communications involving at least one US person.
I think it is potentially cause for concern, even from pure US standpont.
The question, however, is exactly what is being done.

The Guardian article describes a process whereby algorithms are used to sift out the vast majority of the material.  What happens then?  Is the remainder further refined down using automated processes?  At what step does a human being get involved in reading communications?  What steps, legal requirements and safeguards are being used on the British side and on the American side at each step of this process?

We don't know.

[Berkut]

The intercept probes on the transatlantic cables gave GCHQ access to its special source exploitation. Tempora allowed the agency to set up internet buffers so it could not simply watch the data live but also store it – for three days in the case of content and 30 days for metadata.

That is a statement of capability.
Question is how is that capability used. 

Indeed, a lot of Snowden's "revelation" has been about capability, with the reporting very carefully worded to be as alarming as possible.

"The NSA can listen to any US citizens phone call!". Now, that is likely true, but it is stating a capability, not what is legal. You might as well say that any US police officer *can* search your house whenever they want, because they have a gun, and they are physically capable of doing so. That doesn't mean it is legal for them to do so, nor does it mean that it is a problem.

This is no different. Do I think the NSA can tap my phone? Absolutely they can. Of course they can - there is no way in hell they don't have that *technical* capability, and I've known they had that capability for a rather long time.

So what?

Before cell phones, I don't doubt that the NSA could tap my home phone - they could almost certainly send someone into my house while I am away and stick an actual physical bug on my phone and I would never be the wiser. Again...so what?

I've never relied on their technical incompetence to protect me from an illegal wiretap, or hoped that the only thing stopping the police from walking into my house and searching it on a whim was some physical limitation stopping them from doing so.

[Berkut]

I think the extent that the US Average Joe cares is a lot more related to the government listening to US phone calls.

Mostly I think we are all ok with the US listening to all your guys phone calls.

These are transatlantic cables, so a lot of it is going to capture communications involving at least one US person.
I think it is potentially cause for concern, even from pure US standpont.
The question, however, is exactly what is being done.

The Guardian article describes a process whereby algorithms are used to sift out the vast majority of the material.  What happens then?  Is the remainder further refined down using automated processes?  At what step does a human being get involved in reading communications?  What steps, legal requirements and safeguards are being used on the British side and on the American side at each step of this process?

We don't know.

Of course.

But then, I never knew what was the process for any number of different ways intelligence agencies can illicitly gain intelligence, and how they go about making sure to remain with US law while they busily break everyone else.

[Syt]

The intercept probes on the transatlantic cables gave GCHQ access to its special source exploitation. Tempora allowed the agency to set up internet buffers so it could not simply watch the data live but also store it – for three days in the case of content and 30 days for metadata.

I think the more relevant part of the article is:

The processing centres apply a series of sophisticated computer programmes in order to filter the material through what is known as MVR – massive volume reduction. The first filter immediately rejects high-volume, low-value traffic, such as peer-to-peer downloads, which reduces the volume by about 30%. Others pull out packets of information relating to "selectors" – search terms including subjects, phone numbers and email addresses of interest. Some 40,000 of these were chosen by GCHQ and 31,000 by the NSA. Most of the information extracted is "content", such as recordings of phone calls or the substance of email messages. The rest is metadata.

[crazy canuck]

What part of storing content did you not understand?

No need to get snarky.  If the idea that every single phone call made can be captured doesnt astonish you then fine.  It astonishes me.  The main point relevant to this discussion however is that amount of information cannot possibly be viewed by any government in any meaningful way.  Indeed the article you posted says that it would be impossible to access all this information and so the information is refined by filters in some way to get at "needles" that might be useful.

How that remaining information is accessed and by whom is less clear from the article.  Although I note the source for the article states that by step in the process everything is done pursuant to applicable warrants.