Former CIA and NSA employee source of intelligence leaks

[Neil]

They would have better luck with the Russians if they said the opposite.  Torture and death are core values of the Putin justice system.

But then again, the one thing Russians love even more than torture is bullying.  This way, they get to tell themselves that they're pushing around the US, keeping them from executing this guy.  As an added bonus, he'll probably be tortured in prison.

[citizen k]

They would have better luck with the Russians if they said the opposite.  Torture and death are core values of the Putin justice system.

But then again, the one thing Russians love even more than torture is bullying.  This way, they get to tell themselves that they're pushing around the US, keeping them from executing this guy.  As an added bonus, he'll probably be tortured in prison.

They didn't mention he'll be flown home on a 787. 

[citizen k]

Imagine seeing this story in the 80's, the US asking Russia to deliver one of their citizens, on the promise he won't be killed or tortured. Would anyone have believed this would be the situation thirty years later?

[Razgovory]

They would have better luck with the Russians if they said the opposite.  Torture and death are core values of the Putin justice system.

But then again, the one thing Russians love even more than torture is bullying.  This way, they get to tell themselves that they're pushing around the US, keeping them from executing this guy.  As an added bonus, he'll probably be tortured in prison.

The Russians are probably wondering what the US will pay for him.

[Admiral Yi]

I propose we give them another third of Georgia.

[The Brain]

Imagine seeing this story in the 80's, the US asking Russia to deliver one of their citizens, on the promise he won't be killed or tortured. Would anyone have believed this would be the situation thirty years later?

No. It's bizarre how naive the Russians have become.

[jimmy olsen]

Hopefully this one will pass.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2013/07/29/patrick_leahy_s_fisa_accountability_and_privacy_protection_act_would_curtail.html

Last week, an effort in Congress to scale back the NSA's surveillance of Americans failed after a close vote. But another new law that could significantly rein in the government's spy programs is being proposed.

As part of a bipartisan push to reform surveillance laws, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., has introduced the FISA Accountability and Privacy Protection Act of 2013. The bill aims to bring more judicial oversight, public accountability, and transparency to the secret surveillance powers used by the NSA and FBI, focusing specifically on controversial sections of the Patriot Act and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The bill is co-sponsored by nine senators, including several outspoken critics of current spy laws, like Mark Udall, D-Colo., Ron Wyden D-Ore., Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and Mike Lee, R-Utah.

The bill would, among other things:

*    Narrow the scope of the section 215 of the Patriot Act, the law used by the NSA to gather millions of Americans' phone records on a daily basis. Under Leahy's bill, to obtain the data the government would first have to produce a statement of facts showing that it is relevant to an authorized investigation and that there is a link to a foreign group or power.

*    Allow for judicial review of "gag order" provisions of the Patriot Act that can stop a recipient from challenging a nondisclosure order until one year has passed.

*    Bring forward the sunset clause of the recently renewed FISA Amendments Act by more than two years, to June 2015, enabling a sooner "re-examination" of the controversial spy law.

*    Require the inspector general of the intelligence community to conduct a comprehensive review of the FISA Amendments Act and its impact on the privacy rights of all Americans.

*    Mandate the production of an unclassified report for the public that would review the impact of the government's secret surveillance powers on the privacy of Americans.

Leahy, who is separately pushing to update an outdated privacy law to protect email from warrantless snooping, says he has been trying for the last two Congresses to bring reform to the surveillance laws, but so far he has been unsuccessful. This time, however, his chances of success are surely markedly higher. More so than at any time in more than a decade, concern is mounting about the extent of the NSA's sweeping surveillance programs, which have been exposed to an unprecedented level of public scrutiny and debate following a series of leaked secret documents in June. Last week, in a sign that support for the government's spy initiatives is waning, an amendment that would have cut funding for the NSA's mass phone records collection was defeated in the House by a narrow 205-217 majority. The vote, described as "extraordinary" and "amazing" by senators who have been pushing for reform of surveillance laws for years, was taken as an indication that support is rapidly growing for enhanced oversight measures because in recent years votes on reining in NSA surveillance powers have usually been voted down with much larger majorities.

On Wednesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee, which Leahy chairs, will host a public hearing on privacy issues in the wake of the disclosures about the NSA surveillance programs. Senior officials from the NSA, FBI, and the Justice Department will be attending—and can expect to face what will no doubt be a severe grilling from Leahy. "I remain deeply concerned about the expansive use of government surveillance under FISA," the senator said in a statement announcing the hearing. "As I have said, just because we have the ability to collect huge amounts of data, it does not mean that we should be doing so."

[jimmy olsen]

Hmm...

http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/nsa-tool-tracks-all-internet-conversations-says-guardian-6C10808165

NSA tool tracks all Internet conversations, says Guardian
Suzanne Choney NBC News

Americans' email and online chats can be monitored without authorization by any National Security Agency analyst using a computer program known as "XKeyscore," according to NSA leaker Edward Snowden, who shared the information with the Guardian in a story published Wednesday.

XKeyscore is described by the NSA in training materials as its "widest reaching" means of gathering information from the Internet, according to the Guardian. Using the program, "analysts can also search by name, telephone number, IP address, keywords, the language in which the Internet activity was conducted or the type of browser used."

NSA analysts "can also use XKeyscore and other NSA systems to obtain ongoing 'real-time' interception of an individual's Internet activity," the Guardian said.

The NSA documents contend that by the year 2008, 300 terrorists had been captured using information gathered with XKeyscore, the newspaper said.

At a press briefing Wednesday, White House spokesman Jay Carney said that "some of the claims made in that article are false."

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., and ranking member Dutch Ruppersberger, D-Md., released a joint statement saying "The latest in the parade of classified leaks published today is without context and provides a completely inaccurate picture of the program."

XKeyscore, they said, "does not target American citizens. Further, the program referenced in the story is not used for indiscriminate monitoring of the Internet, as many falsely believe. Rather, the program is simply a tool used by our intelligence analysts to better understand foreign intelligence, including terrorist targets overseas."

Snowden referenced XKeyscore, although not by name, in June, when his first interviews with the British newspaper were published. In a Guardian video interview, Snowden said, "I, sitting at my desk, certainly had the authorities to wiretap anyone, from you or your accountant, to a federal judge, to even the president if I had a personal email."

Nor is this the first public mention of XKeyscore. Earlier this month, German intelligence agencies said the NSA gave them XKeyscore to use, according to documents seen by Der Spiegel reporters, with the program meant to "expand their ability to support NSA as we jointly prosecute CT [counter-terrorism] targets."

XKeyscore was also described earlier this year in "Deep State: Inside the Government Secrecy Industry," a book by Marc Ambinder and D.B. Grady published earlier this year.

"At Fort Meade, a program called XKeyscore processes all signals before they are shunted off to various 'production lines' that deal with specific issues," the authors wrote.

David Brown, who wrote "Deep State" using D.B. Grady as a pen name, told NBC News that what is "surprising everybody" with the XKeyscore information is "just how easily low-level analysts can access the data. The impediments that are supposed to be there really aren't."

"I like to think of it as plumbing," he said. "The pipes come in through XKeyscore, which then diverts the data through different channels, because there's just an awful lot of data."

Another NSA tool, called DNI Presenter, the Guardian said, lets an analyst who uses XKeyscore "read the content of Facebook chats or private messages," as well as the content of stored emails. Facebook declined to comment to NBC News about the report.

The amount of information gathered using XKeyscore is "staggeringly large," the newspaper said. "One NSA report from 2007 estimated that there were 850 billion 'call events' collected and stored in the NSA databases, and close to 150 billion Internet records. Each day, the document says, 1-2b billion records were added."

The Guardian said the XKeyscore training materials shared by Snowden show how easy it is for analysts to use it "and other systems to mine enormous agency databases by filling in a simple on-screen form giving only a broad justification for the search. The request is not reviewed by a court or any NSA personnel before it is processed."

If that claim is true, it may conflict with U.S. legal requirements for performing digital surveillance of Americans, that the NSA obtain a warrant first from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court.

"As we've explained, and the intelligence community has explained, allegations of widespread, unchecked analyst access to NSA collection data are false," said White House spokesman Carney.

"Access to all of NSA's analytic tools is limited to only those personnel who require access for their assigned tasks," he continued. "And there are multiple technical, manual and supervisory checks and balances within the system to prevent those who don't have access from achieving that access."

'Straightforward answers'
The Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday held a hearing on the oversight of FISA surveillance programs, which may have something to do with the timing of the Guardian's story. Also underway Wednesday was the annual Black Hat hackers' conference in Las Vegas, where Gen. Keith Alexander, head of the NSA, spoke to a somewhat hostile crowd.

"The assumption is that people are out there just wheeling and dealing, and nothing could be further from the truth," he said in a speech there Wednesday. "We have tremendous oversight in these programs ... You know that we can audit the actions of our people 100 percent in this case, and we do that."

Congressmen Rogers and Ruppersberger echoed Alexander's remarks, saying the Guardian story "also once again ignores the legal constraints, comprehensive training, and layers of oversight built into all NSA programs. Every search on the program by an NSA analyst is fully auditable to ensure it is done within the law."

But at the Senate hearing in Washington, D.C., Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. and chairman of the committee said, "We need straightforward answers. I'm concerned we're not getting them.

"I think the patience of the American people is beginning to wear thin, but what has to be of more concern in a democracy is the trust of the American people is wearing thin."

Also on Wednesday, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper released declassified documents relating to the government's collection of Americans' telephone data, one of the first disclosures by Snowden in June.

Jameel Jaffer, the American Civil Liberties Union's deputy legal director, said in a statement that the Guardian's "latest revelations make clear that the government's surveillance activities are far more extensive and intrusive than previously understood, and they underscore that the surveillance laws are in desperate need of reform."

Meanwhile, Snowden remains in Russia, where he has spent more than a month in the transit zone of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, as he seeks temporary asylum there.

[Sheilbh]

As ever Greenwald and the Guardian overpromise and the US bureaucracy's love affair with baffling names continues:
http://theweek.com/article/index/247684/whats-xkeyscore

[Razgovory]

I propose we give them another third of Georgia.

I like this idea.  Maybe we can throw in the top part of Florida as well.

[Valmy]

As ever Greenwald and the Guardian overpromise

Maybe if there was more transparency the government would not be subject to the righteous efforts of the defenders of liberty

By the way your counter-revolutionary aristo-sympathizing ways have been noticed by the committee

[Ed Anger]

I can't wait until Glen Greeneald's tragic shaving accident.

[Kleves]

And the Russians have given him asylum:

MOSCOW, Russia - NSA leaker Edward Snowden has been granted temporary asylum in Russia and has left the Moscow airport where he had been stranded for more than a month, his lawyer said Thursday.

An airport representative told Reuters that the former intelligence contractor had already crossed through the immigration line and left the airport.

Snowden's lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, said he wouldn't disclose the 30-year-old fugitive's whereabouts for security reasons.

"He is the most wanted man on planet Earth. What do you think he is going to do? He has to think about his personal security. I cannot tell you where he is going," Kucherena told Reuters.

I put him in a taxi 15 to 20 minutes ago and gave him his certificate on getting refugee status in the Russian Federation," he said. "He can live wherever he wants in Russia. It's his personal choice."

WikiLeaks also posted on Twitter that Snowden had left the airport.

"We would like to thank the Russian people and all those others who have helped to protect Mr. Snowden," it said in a tweet.

"We have won the battle -- now the war."

Marie Harf, a State Department deputy spokesperson, told reporters Wednesday that Snowden was "not a human rights activist."

"He's not a dissident. He's been accused of leaking classified information, has been charged with three very serious felony counts, and must be, should be, returned to the United States to face a free and fair trial as soon as possible," she said at the daily briefing.

"We are working through law enforcement channels with the Russian government to make the point that Mr. Snowden is wanted on serious felony charges and needs to be returned to the United States."

But Harf added that the U.S. had also "made the point that we don't want this issue to have a hugely negative impact on our bilateral relationship."

A senior Kremlin official, Yuri Ushakov, told Reuters that he doubted ties between Russia and the United States would suffer because of the "relatively insignificant" Snowden case.

"Our president has ... expressed hope many times that this will not affect the character of our relations," he told reporters, saying there was no sign that U.S. President Barack Obama would cancel a planned visit to Moscow in September.

Well, probably easier for him to have an "accident" now.

[DontSayBanana]

As ever Greenwald and the Guardian overpromise and the US bureaucracy's love affair with baffling names continues:
http://theweek.com/article/index/247684/whats-xkeyscore

Wow, short enough that even I didn't need a tl;dr summary.  So it basically functions as an API, and really has nothing to do with the actual surveillance tools.

[KRonn]

Putin once again pokes a finger at the US, and likely enjoys doing what he can to take jabs at the US.