CNET Story Alleging NSA Can Listen To Phone Calls w/o Warrant Faces Skepticism - BIG UPDATE

[DevonRex]

74. Well, Robert,

I have been extraordinarily aware of the possibilities for a long, long time. Ever since I started in MI a long time ago. SIGINT, to be exact. Working as an Electronic Warfare Signals Intelligence Voice Interceptor, 98G2LRU (Russian language).

Capable? Hell, your local PD is capable of tapping your phone. And in case you missed this, I've been yelling at people for a week now to read up on Echelon. Nobody ever has. But just so happens somebody wrote a current article about it. Maybe you'll be interested. Anyway, NSA has been capable of doing a lot of things for decades.

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Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/60-minutes-reported-nsa-spying-in-2000-2013-6#ixzz2WMAEfaK6
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And the transcript from the 60 Minutes Show from the year 2000
http://cryptome.org/echelon-60min.htm
60 MINUTES

Television Broadcast February 27, 2000

ECHELON; WORLDWIDE CONVERSATIONS BEING RECEIVED BY THE ECHELON SYSTEM MAY FALL INTO THE WRONG HANDS AND INNOCENT PEOPLE MAY BE TAGGED AS SPIES

STEVE KROFT, co-host:

If you made a phone call today or sent an e-mail to a friend, there's a good chance what you said or wrote was captured and screened by the country's largest intelligence agency. The top-secret Global Surveillance Network is called Echelon, and it's run by the National Security Agency and four English-speaking allies: Canada, Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

The mission is to eavesdrop on enemies of the state: foreign countries, terrorist groups and drug cartels. But in the process, Echelon's computers capture virtually every electronic conversation around the world.

How does it work, and what happens to all the information that's gathered? A lot of people have begun to ask that question, and some suspect that the information is being used for more than just catching bad guys.

(Footage of satellite; person talking on cell phone; fax machine; ATM being used; telephone pole and wires; radio towers)

KROFT: (Voiceover) We can't see them, but the air around us is filled with invisible electronic signals, everything from cell phone conversations to fax transmissions to ATM transfers. What most people don't realize is that virtually every signal radiated across the electromagnetic spectrum is being collected and analyzed.
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So, Robert, Google Echelon and then follow all the links in the Wikipedia article and at the end. I warn you, though. Switzerland's program, Onyx, is harder to find now. You have to use disambiguation. Don't forget to check out UKUSA.

So, don't say I have blinders on. I never have had.