Court Rules NSA Doesn't Have to Reveal Its Semi-Secret Relationship With Google

[Hissyspit]

Source: Forbes

Andy Greenberg, Forbes Staff

SECURITY | 5/11/2012 @ 12:30PM |1,271 views

Court Rules NSA Doesn't Have To Reveal Its Semi-Secret Relationship With Google
 
If the world’s largest surveillance agency has a working relationship with the world’s largest Internet firm, that’s no one’s business but theirs, according to an appeals court in the DC Circuit.

In the ruling issued Friday, (PDF here ) the court decided that the National Security Agency doesn’t need to either confirm or deny its relationship with Google in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by the Electronic Privacy Information Center, ruling that a FOIA exemption covers any documents whose exposure might hinder the NSA’s national security mission. Beyond merely rejecting the FOIA request, the court has agreed with the NSA that it has the right to simply not respond to the request, as even a rejection of the request might reveal details of a suspected relationship with Google that it has sought to keep secret.

“If NSA disclosed whether there are (or are not) records of a partnership or communications between Google and NSA regarding Google’s security, that disclosure might reveal whether NSA investigated the threat, deemed the threat a concern to the security of U.S. Government information systems, or took any measures in response to the threat,” the court’s ruling read. “As such, any information pertaining to the relationship between Google and NSA would reveal protected information about NSA’s implementation of its Information Assurance mission.”

Since just after Google revealed in early 2010 that it had been hacked by cyberspies seemingly based in China, the Washington Post reported that Google and the NSA had partnered to help bolster the company’s defenses against future attacks. NSA director Mike McConnell followed up with an op-ed in the Post, which included a statement that a partnership with Google was “inevitable.”

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/05/11/court-rules-nsa-doesnt-have-to-reveal-its-semi-secret-relationship-with-google

[JDPriestly]

1. Well. There again, we the people, who govern by the people are

kept in ignorance by the unknown AUTHORITIES who are supposed to be governing for the people.

What can be more vital to our national security than informing VOTERS about what the government the VOTERS supposedly elect.

What is the point in voting if you aren't allowed to know what the folks you elect are doing?

Sorry about the caps, but I would scream this out if I were talking to you in person.

[24601]

3. I just spent a bit of time on their website. NSA's authorities aren't unknown. The NSA Director,

GEN Alexander, reports to the Secretary of Defense. Both of those individuals are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. NSA has two main missions - one is to produce intelligence on other nations' signals. The other mission is to secure the US classified communications. In other words, they make our codes and break the other guys' codes.

GEN Alexander also is commander of the US Cyber Command, and in that role he works for the Commander of the US Strategic Command (Headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska). Cybercom's mission is to keep our military networks working and deny it to adversaries.

Congressional Intel committees exercise oversight for NSA and the Armed Service Committees have oversight for Cybercom. Both are in the Executive Branch, headed by the President. And both are in the Department of Defense.

But this stuff is not hard to find and it's not hard to understand. The President, other policymakers, and military commanders need to know what other nations are capable of and what they intend to do. And they need to have communications that are reliable and secure.

Sure, they are public about what they do. That's very different from revealing how they do it. Because it you reveal the methods, it's too easy for adversaries to counter it.

[JDPriestly]

8. The American public should have the right to know what information the search engine

Google supplies about American individuals to the NSA.

The East German STASI would have loved to have the tools the NSA has. Is America better than East Germany? Do we need a STASI?

Should we reign in our STASI?

This is something that should be decided by the American people based on full knowledge of the extent of our American STASI or NSA's activities in the US.

The Fourth Amendment is in the Constitution for a reason.

Our government plays all sorts of intellectual games to convince itself it needs to invade our personal privacy.

Free speech is meaningless if we cannot say what we want without government snoopers listening and looking in.

Get the NSA and all the other government agencies out of the business of America on the internet. Tell them to go snoop in other countries if they must, but not here.

[24601]

10. The article reports that it was Google that approached NSA, not the other way around. And the

reason for not disclosing the relationship, or lack of a relationship was that it could reveal,

"whether NSA investigated the threat, deemed the threat a concern to the security of U.S. Government information systems, or took any measures in response to the threat,”

It's not about what Google or NSA knows about you, but what they know about a foreign threat, and what could be inferred about what they do about it.

It's also worth noting that this is NSA's Information Assurance mission, not their Signals Intelligence mission.

Do you insist that the FBI tells you everything they know about everyone trafficking in child pornography? Of course they won't disclose it because it would compromise their investigations and give the bad guys the knowledge about how to defeat their investigation.

[24601]

2. "NSA Director Mike McConnell" hasn't been NSA Director since February 1996. What they heck, they

missed by only a little more than 16 years. Gives me a lot of confidence in anything else they reported, not.

http://www.nsa.gov/about/leadership/former_directors.shtml

[tru]

5. so they missed former not current. not a big deal. lmho. n/t

[TygrBright]

4. Wait, what? That was supposed to be a SECRET?! LOL... n/t

[valerief]

6. Ah, just the toxins in fragrances, which have trade-secret protection. nt

[sofa king]

7. "We don't have to tell you" probably tells us enough.

[Fearless]

9. Because they don't understand technology. We need a younger judiciary.