The Snooping Goes Beyond Phone Calls

[Robbien]

How the government sidesteps the Privacy Act by purchasing commercial data

Furor and confusion over allegations that major phone companies have surrendered customer calling records to the National Security Agency continue to roil Washington. But if AT&T Inc. (T ) and possibly others have turned over records to the NSA, the phone giants represent only one of many commercial sources of personal data that the government seeks to "mine" for evidence of terrorist plots and other threats.


The Departments of Justice, State, and Homeland Security spend millions annually to buy commercial databases that track Americans' finances, phone numbers, and biographical information, according to a report last month by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress. Often, the agencies and their contractors don't ensure the data's accuracy, the GAO found.

Buying commercially collected data allows the government to dodge certain privacy rules. The Privacy Act of 1974 restricts how federal agencies may use such information and requires disclosure of what the government is doing with it. But the law applies only when the government is doing the data collecting.

"Grabbing data wholesale from the private sector is the way agencies are getting around the requirements of the Privacy Act and the Fourth Amendment," says Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington and a member of the Homeland Security Dept.'s Data Privacy & Integrity Advisory Committee.

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_22/b3986068.htm

[tridim]

1. America needs a do-over

It's just not working.

Will they get away with this?

[Syrinx]

3. magic eight ball says...

"signs point to yes." :(

[life_long_dem]

2. The snooping goes beyond phone calls

and the lying goes beyond belief, by this administration.

Thanks for posting that.

[saigon68]

30. Lying like rugs

[truthisfreedom]

4. here we are in 1984 all over again.

hold back the hems of your skirts, ladies... we're about to descend into hell.

[regnaD kciN]

5. The Bush maladministration will be over soon...

...but the $64,000 question is: will the White House's next occupants be any better? Even if a Democrat were to win, with a Democratic Congress backing them, would they move to abjure this destruction of privacy? Or, given the tools to exert such control of Americans, would they justify it by saying, essentially, "well, we're on the side of good, so we won't abuse those powers, even if we still retain them?"

[Robbien]

7. Depends whether he is from the left or right side of the party

Don't know how far I would trust the right side of the party to do the right thing here.

Somehow I cannot see a progressive not shutting this down.

[CrispyQ]

27. Excellent question.

My money's on them justifying it.

[lindisfarne]

6. See also article about Clinton's ThinThread program, which was legal and

more effective than Bush's program. But which may not have provided the details BushCo wanted.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/051906K.shtml
The Baltimore Sun reported today that Bush rejected President Clinton's effective, legal surveillance program that did not invade privacy to adopt the current NSA spying program, which is ineffective, illegal and invasive of citizens' privacy rights. So, the question jumping off the page may be: Why would Bush use a program that does not actually assist the finding of terrorists, yet also has the disadvantage of invading Americans' privacy rights?

The Clinton surveillance program, called ThinThread, was created during the late 1990s to "gather and analyze massive amounts of communications data without running afoul of privacy laws." Several bloggers provide excellent posts on the components and nature of the program.

The key to evaluating Bush's true motive for his NSA program is that testing of ThinThread showed it was far better in finding potential threats and protecting privacy than the current NSA program that Bush chose in its stead. "For example, its ability to sort through massive amounts of data to find threat-related communications far surpassed the existing system, sources said. It also was able to rapidly separate and encrypt U.S.-related communications to ensure privacy." But, Gen. Hayden of NSA decided not to use these two tools or the monitoring feature to prevent abuse of the records. The problem is that not using the ThinThread program has "undermined the agency's ability to zero in on potential threats." Moreover, "ThinThread could have provided a simple solution to privacy concerns."

Incredibly, the ThinThread program was far superior to the NSA program in place in 2004:

A number of independent studies, including a classified 2004 report from the Pentagon's inspector-general, in addition to the successful pilot tests, found that the program provided 'superior processing, filtering and protection of U.S. citizens, and discovery of important and previously unknown targets,' said an intelligence official familiar with the program who described the reports to The Sun. The Pentagon report concluded that ThinThread's ability to sort through data in 2001 was far superior to that of another NSA system in place in 2004, and that the program should be launched and enhanced.
m

[Usrename]

8. But they could not get the good insider info that is so valuable.

You know, all those day-traders in Frist's office need good insider information to really cash in. Bastards.

[Triana]

16. "program that does not assist in the finding of terrorists"...

...why would bu$hit use it? Because he's NOT trying to find terrorists. He's trying to spy on innocent people, PETA, anti-war and environmental groups, his political opponents, whoever/whatever they are.

[stepnw1f]

22. This is the Info the Right Wing Tries to Twist Alot

to defend Bush with. The silly assholes have flooded this country with so much misinformation. But I see everyday the truth pushing back... their House of Cards are falling down.

[Supersedeas]

29. a nice contrast -- thanks for the link

[katinmn]

9. Sigh. All those millions (billions?) spent spying on us could be

pulling people out of poverty, providing life-saving health care, funding college educations and giving hope for a future.
America is sick.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

more from the article:

"The Justice Dept. alone, which includes the FBI, spent $19 million in fiscal 2005 to obtain commercially gathered names, addresses, phone numbers, and other data, according to the GAO. The Justice Dept. obeys the Privacy Act and "protects information that might personally identify an individual," a spokesman says. Despite the GAO's findings, a Homeland Security spokesman denies that his agency purchases consumer records from private companies. The State Dept. didn't respond to requests for comment."

snip

"Based in Sterling, Va., NeuStar has developed a lucrative niche in the routing of millions of phone calls a day from one carrier to the next. "Nearly every telephone call placed is routed using NeuStar's system, and every telecommunications service provider is one of NeuStar's customers," the company's Web site states. NeuStar doesn't keep records of the calls it handles, a spokeswoman says.

Now NeuStar is seeking to profit from increased post-September 11 government pressure on telecoms to turn over data. Last year it acquired Fiducianet Inc., which helps phone company clients comply with "subpoenas, court orders, and law enforcement agency requests under electronic surveillance laws," according to a February, 2005, NeuStar press release. NeuStar says this part of its business accounts for less than 1% of total revenue. The company went public last June and reported 2005 revenue of $242.5 million."

[LiberalPartisan]

10. In the EU - you own your identitiy information implicitly

Any collection and dissemination of it can only be done with your permission and only for a very short period before it must be destroyed or you reauthorize it.


It is a vastly superior approach to that used here.

[MadHound]

11. Don't be so hasty to exonerate Europe

After all, they are the most filmed people in the Western World, if not the entire world. Granted, we're starting to catch up, but Europe is not the panacea of privacy that you're making out here.

[Eurobabe]

33. might not be perfect but better than US

can't wait to move there, packers here now. Fleeing...

[katinmn]

13. Are you kidding? The USA is following Britain's lead on domestic spying!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/10/31/wfbi31.xml/
US may set up MI5-style spy agency in security shake-up
By Toby Harnden in Washington
(Filed: 31/10/2002)

America is contemplating a radical overall of the FBI and the creation of a domestic spying organisation modelled on Britain's MI5, according to US intelligence sources.

[leveymg]

14. Sorry - But, NSA takes it all anyway.

If you're visiting any .com. .org .edu. .biz .us .gov site on the web, or anywhere on the web that's connected through these sites -- that's practically every commercial site on the WWW -- NSA is there.

[Rich Hunt]

17. sounds reasonable

.....I wonder what would prompt a person to reject that. :v

[teknomanzer]

18. Damn! I thought I Chertoff looked like someone I had seen

before. I just couldn't put my finger on it. Your Lenin picture gave me one of those AHA! moments.

[intheflow]

12. So now they're spending our tax dollars to buy our private information?

This is just bullshit! :kick: and recommended.

[leveymg]

15. Despotisms strive to be self-financing. This one's profitable. eom

[Minnesota Libra]

19. All I can say to this is, it stands to reason that if the public and......

....corporations can access such information then the government has long ago figured out how to access it or just out and out by it. Then they match it to info they already have or are in the process of gaining and away they go to do whatever they choose.

I don't think we know even the half of what this administration and future administrations will be up to. "1984" is in full swing and we will never get away from it again. Don't think just because we get rid of this administration that these practices will end either, they won't.

[peaches2003]

20. Who to blame?

It's a given that the Bush Adm is corrupt and forming a fascst dictatorship. But who to blame that this is being allowed to happen?

1. Congress- they know and are doing nothing
2. The press- they know and are saying next to nothing
3. The American public- they really don't want to know and are letting it happen

[katinmn]

21. Exactly. Everyone shares the blame. n/t

[yellowcanine]

23. Sounds as if Felon John Poindexter and his Total Information Awareness

program never was shut down after all .....

http://www.thememoryhole.org/policestate/iao-logo.htm

[tanyev]

24. Why buy it when you can just steal it?

I am getting more and more suspicious of all of the banks, credit companies, and other institutions whose databases were compromised in the last couple of years.

[paparush]

25. Tell me again, exactly HOW MANY terrorists has this caught??

This administration is absolutely evil.

The FISA Courts were already a Constitutional stretch...grudgingly approved by an informed Congress. Bush** has blown that standard completely away. Completely ignored it. Look at the precedence this sets for future regimes, er, administrations.

[lindisfarne]

28. Clinton's (legal) ThinThread prog. would have, acc. to frmr NSA head:

(Bush dismantled Clinton's program)

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/051906K.shtml
While Bush proclaims that his NSA program is for the purpose of finding terrorists, this article says it is not effective for that purpose. On the other hand, the former head of NSA operations division told the 9/11 Commission that "ThinThread could have identified the hijackers had it been in place before the attacks." Is that why Bush team often states that NSA surveillance would have permitted the identification and capture of the 9/11 hijackers had it been in place prior to 9/11? That is, the general statements made by Bush are true for ThinThread, which is a NSA surveillance program, just not the program that Bush is using. So, in accordance with Bush's parsing practice, his statements would be technically true, just misleadingly false.

[Zorra]

26. In a budding fascist state, snooping knows no boundaries.

It can be assumed that what we know of their snooping is only the tip of the iceberg.

Hi Agent Mike!
:hi:

[orleans]

31. you gotta admit this program is working out really well

i mean, look at all the terrorists we've caught due to this nsa crap--look at the number of terrorist plots we've foiled....the list is so long they can't even begin to be specific

[lonestarnot]

32. And spending our tax dollars to do so.