ABA Blasts the Specter NSA Bill-Calls for Congress to
Wake Up!
By: John Amato on Saturday, July 22nd, 2006 at 1:43 PM - PDT UPDATE: 5/11/06
BCST 8/27/06
C-SPAN BOOK TV - 9/11 COMMISSION INTERVIEW
9/11 ACCOUNTABILTY Vs. "The Case For Impeachment"
AUDIO (ABOUT 55 MINUTES)
http://www.apfn.net/pogo/L002I060827-911-impeachment2.MP3
9/11 ACCOUNTABILITY....WE WHERE VERY UNJUDGEMENTAL
THE 9/11 COMMISSION....THESE GUYS ARE SHOCKING!!!!
AUDIO:
http://www.apfn.net/pogo/L001I060827-911-impeachment1.MP3
'Climate has changed' for
data privacy
By Paul Davidson, USA TODAY
A USA TODAY report Thursday that a U.S. spy agency has been secretly
collecting phone-call records of millions of Americans is just the latest
case of companies turning over private customer data to the government.
Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, airlines, websites and Las Vegas
hotels have divulged private customer information to federal authorities
hunting for terrorists or criminals.
"The climate has changed, and many companies give less weight to the privacy
interests of their customers," says David Sobel of the Electronic Privacy
Information Center (EPIC).
Yet privacy advocates say the new case is more egregious because phone
records are afforded even greater protections and the information was
obtained without a warrant.
"It's an inexcusable violation of the trust we place in the phone company to
maintain the privacy of communications," says Kevin Bankston of advocacy
group Electronic Frontier Foundation. The group sued AT&T in January for
aiding the National Security Agency in eavesdropping.
The NSA obtained the call records from AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, which
are working under contract with the NSA, USA TODAY reported. Qwest refused
to turn over its information out of legal concerns. The NSA did not get
approval from a special court set up to OK electronic surveillance of
suspected terrorists.
It's unclear whether the government used another legal tool, such as a
"national security letter," which allows the FBI to secretly obtain customer
records without court approval.
Sobel, though, said national security letters "always have been used fairly
surgically" as part of specific investigations.
The Bush administration has argued the USA Patriot Act gives it wide
authority to protect citizens. Other customer-data cases:
• The most similar incident occurred after the 2001 attacks, when airlines
including American, Delta, JetBlue and Northwest shared millions of
passenger records with the government or federal contractors.
Yet the airlines were simply violating their own policies not to disclose
customer records, and those promises "were never very clear," says Marc
Rotenberg, EPIC's executive director. The Transportation Department
dismissed a complaint against Northwest because its policy merely said it
would not sell data. It didn't address sharing it with the government.
• When intelligence suggested a possible 2003 New Year's Eve attack in Las
Vegas, the government began assembling records of about 270,000 hotel guests
and airplane passengers who visited the city Dec. 22 to Jan. 1, the Las
Vegas Review-Journal reported. Yet there was no specific and credible
terrorist threat, the newspaper said.
• Last year, the Justice Department demanded that AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft MSN
and Google hand over customer search records in a bid to prove that
filtering software doesn't screen kids from online porn. Only Google
refused, and a judge ultimately ruled that the search giant need turn over
only 50,000 Web addresses, not the 1 million originally subpoenaed. Also,
Justice said the information would not identify individuals.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/2006-05-11-biz-privacy-usat_x.htm
==================================================================
Court Filings Tell of
Internet Spying
Published: April 7, 2006
WASHINGTON, April 6 — A former AT&T technician said on Thursday that the
company cooperated with the National Security Agency in 2003 to install
equipment capable of "vacuum-cleaner surveillance" of e-mail messages and
other Internet traffic.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/07/us/nationalspecial3/07spy.html?ex=1145160000&en=d6b8d8cd5e397cdc&ei=5070
“Not only is the NSA's spying program unauthorized by federal
law, but we suspect that conversations of thousands of Americans
have been subjected to illegal surveillance by the NSA.”
Dave Fidanque, executive director
of the ACLU chapter in Oregon |
|
2001: Bush
Warned of Tech Dangers
Associated Press Associated Press
WASHINGTON -- The nation's electronic intelligence agency warned President
Bush in 2001 that monitoring U.S. adversaries would require a "permanent
presence" on networks that also carry Americans' messages that are protected
from government eavesdropping.
The warning was contained in a National Security Agency report entitled
"Transition 2001," sent to Bush shortly after he took office and reflects
the agency's major concerns at the time.
The report was obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by the National
Security Archive, a private security watchdog group at George Washington
University that made the document public.
The papers offer a rare glimpse into the usually publicity-shy NSA, which
monitors communications involving foreign targets and does code-making and
breaking.
The document showed an agency making a case to the White House that
information security should be a top priority. It raised questions about how
new global communications technologies were challenging the Constitution's
protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
"Make no mistake, NSA can and will perform its missions consistent with the
Fourth Amendment and all applicable laws," the document says. But, it adds,
senior leadership must understand that the NSA's mission will demand a
"powerful, permanent presence" on global telecommunications networks that
host both "'protected' communications of Americans" and the communications
of adversaries the agency wants to target.
The document also said the global nature of technology leaves government and
private networks more vulnerable to penetration by enemies. The report said
the agency was concerned that federal and private digital networks were now
"more vulnerable to foreign intelligence operations and to compromise."
The documents indicate the NSA was going on an offensive using the new modes
of communication -- mostly digital and able to carry billions of bits of
data. It says the agency is "prepared organizationally, intellectually and
-- with sufficient investment -- technologically to exploit in an
unprecedented way the explosion of global communications."
NSA was also concerned about the security of its parent agency, the Defense
Department. In 1999, the document says, the department experienced over
22,000 cyber attacks, most of which had little effect on operations.
"During the presidential transition period, a major cyber attack is
possible," the agency warned. But no significant cyber attack occurred then.
In the 42-page report, the agency said it had tried to transform itself from
an entity nicknamed "No Such Agency" by dispatching its director to public
events and reaching out to the media. The agency said media representatives
were invited inside the agency for family day in September 2000.
Staffing was clearly a concern of the agency. The documents show a sharp
drop in civilian personnel after the end of the cold war. In 2001, there
were just over 16,000 civilians, down from 22,000 in early 2001. At the
time, 19 percent of the work force was eligible for early retirement.
Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, intelligence agencies have gone on a
hiring spree. The NSA announced last April it intended to hire 1,500 new
employees a year for the next five years, focusing on people fluent in
foreign languages including Arabic and Chinese, intelligence analysts and
technical experts.
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,66884,00.html
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,69886-0.html
IS BUSH
ABOVE THE LAW?
|
TITLE 50 >
CHAPTER 36 >
SUBCHAPTER I > § 1809 |
|
|
§ 1809. Criminal
sanctions |
| Release
date: 2005-03-17 |
(a)
Prohibited
activities
A person is guilty of an offense
if he intentionally—
(1)
engages in
electronic surveillance under
color of law except as
authorized by statute; or
(2)
discloses
or uses information obtained
under color of law by electronic
surveillance, knowing or having
reason to know that the
information was obtained through
electronic surveillance not
authorized by statute.
(b)
Defense
It is a defense to a prosecution
under subsection (a) of this
section that the defendant was a
law enforcement or investigative
officer engaged in the course of
his official duties and the
electronic surveillance was
authorized by and conducted
pursuant to a search warrant or
court order of a court of
competent jurisdiction.
(c)
Penalties
An offense described in this
section is punishable by a fine
of not more than $10,000 or
imprisonment for not more than
five years, or both.
(d)
Federal
jurisdiction
There is Federal jurisdiction
over an offense under this
section if the person committing
the offense was an officer or
employee of the United States at
the time the offense was
committed.
|
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode50/usc_sec_50_00001809----000-.html
NSA
hired to scan all the phone calls and internet traffic in the world
so Bush can spy on you:
http://www.narus.com/
This is the software they
used:
http://www.narus.com/products/intercept.html
"These capabilities include
playback of streaming media (i.e. VoIP), rendering of web pages,
examination of e-mail and the ability to analyze the
payload/attachments of e-mail or file transfer protocols. Narus
partner products offer the ability to quickly analyze information
collected by the Directed Analysis or Lawful Intercept modules."
They are knowingly licensing this software for unlawful purposes as
outlined in this class action law
suit filed by the EFF against AT&T. They have secret rooms
everywhere. An ex-AT&T employee of 22 years has brought 140 pages of
proof and AT&T doesn't deny it.
This company should be sued
NarusInsight Intercept Suite
Packet-level, flow-level, and
application-level usage information is captured and analyzed
as well as raw user session packets for forensic analysis,
surveillance or in satisfying regulatory compliance for
lawful intercept.
The
Lawful Intercept module offers carriers
and service providers compliance with regulatory
requirements regarding lawful intercept. The Lawful
Intercept module provides an end-to-end solution consisting
of Administration, Access and Delivery functions. The Lawful
Intercept module is compliant with CALEA and ETSI standards.
It can be seamlessly integrated with third party products
for testing/validation or as a complete law enforcement
solution.
The
Directed Analysis module seamlessly
integrates with NarusInsight Secure Suite or other DDoS,
intrusion or anomaly detection systems, securely providing
analysts with real-time, surgical targeting of suspect
information (from flow to application to full packets). The
Directed Analyis module provides industry standard formats
and offers tools for archival and integration with third
party investigative tools.
These capabilities include playback of streaming media (i.e.
VoIP), rendering of web pages, examination of e-mail and the
ability to analyze the payload/attachments of e-mail or file
transfer protocols. Narus partner products offer the ability
to quickly analyze information collected by the Directed
Analysis or Lawful Intercept modules. When Narus partners’
powerful analytic tools are combined with the surgical
targeting and real-time collection capabilities of Directed
Analysis and Lawful Intercept modules, analysts or law
enforcement agents are provided capabilities that have been
unavailable thus far.
Customers
Carriers and Governments have deployed Narus around the
world protect their countries and infrastructure.
http://www.narus.com/products/intercept.html
|
AT&T's central office on Folsom Street in San
Francisco houses a secret room that allows the
Natioinal Security Agency to montor phone and
internet traffic, according to former AT&T
technician-cum-whistleblower Mark Klein.
|
AT&T occupied three floors of the SBC-owned
building on San Francisco's Folsom street. |
In addition to this San Francisco office, the NSA
operates identical wiretapping facilities at other AT&T switching
centers around the county, Klein says.
|
A critical junction for telecommunications
traffic, the San Francisco switching center is well guarded -- but
presumably an NSA badge will get you past security. |
Whistle-Blower Outs NSA
Spy Room
By Ryan Singel| Also by this reporter
11:15 AM Apr, 07, 2006
AT&T provided National Security Agency eavesdroppers with full access to its
customers' phone calls, and shunted its customers' internet traffic to
data-mining equipment installed in a secret room in its San Francisco
switching center, according to a former AT&T worker cooperating in the
Electronic Frontier
Foundation's lawsuit against the company.
Mark Klein, a retired AT&T communications technician, submitted an affidavit
in support of the EFF's lawsuit this week. That class action lawsuit, filed
in federal court in San Francisco last January, alleges that AT&T violated
federal and state laws by surreptitiously allowing the government to monitor
phone and internet communications of AT&T customers without warrants.
On Wednesday, the EFF asked the court to issue an injunction prohibiting
AT&T from continuing the alleged wiretapping, and filed a number of
documents under seal, including three AT&T documents that purportedly
explain how the wiretapping system works.
According to a statement released by Klein's attorney, an NSA agent showed
up at the San Francisco switching center in 2002 to interview a
management-level technician for a special job. In January 2003, Klein
observed a new room being built adjacent to the room housing AT&T's #4ESS
switching equipment, which is responsible for routing long distance and
international calls.
"I learned that the person whom the NSA interviewed for the secret job was
the person working to install equipment in this room," Klein wrote. "The
regular technician work force was not allowed in the room."
Klein's job eventually included connecting internet circuits to a splitting
cabinet that led to the secret room. During the course of that work, he
learned from a co-worker that similar cabinets were being installed in other
cities, including Seattle, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego.
"While doing my job, I learned that fiber optic cables from the secret room
were tapping into the Worldnet (AT&T's internet service) circuits by
splitting off a portion of the light signal," Klein wrote.
The split circuits included traffic from peering links connecting to other
internet backbone providers, meaning that AT&T was also diverting traffic
routed from its network to or from other domestic and international
providers, according to Klein's statement.
The secret room also included data-mining equipment called a Narus STA 6400,
"known to be used particularly by government intelligence agencies because
of its ability to sift through large amounts of data looking for
preprogrammed targets," according to Klein's statement.
Narus, whose website touts AT&T as a client, sells software to help internet
service providers and telecoms monitor and manage their networks, look for
intrusions, and wiretap phone calls as mandated by federal law.
Klein said he came forward because he does not believe that the Bush
administration is being truthful about the extent of its extrajudicial
monitoring of Americans' communications.
"Despite what we are hearing, and considering the public track record of
this administration, I simply do not believe their claims that the NSA's
spying program is really limited to foreign communications or is otherwise
consistent with the NSA's charter or with FISA," Klein's wrote. "And unlike
the controversy over targeted wiretaps of individuals' phone calls, this
potential spying appears to be applied wholesale to all sorts of internet
communications of countless citizens."
After asking for a preview copy of the documents last week, the government
did not object to the EFF filing the paper under seal, although the EFF
asked the court Wednesday to make the documents public.
One of the documents is titled "Study Group 3, LGX/Splitter Wiring, San
Francisco," and is dated 2002. The others are allegedly a design document
instructing technicians how to wire up the taps, and a document that
describes the equipment installed in the secret room.
In a letter to the EFF, AT&T objected to the filing of the documents in any
manner, saying that they contain sensitive trade secrets and could be "could
be used to 'hack' into the AT&T network, compromising its integrity."
According to court rules, AT&T has until Thursday to file a motion to keep
the documents sealed. The government could also step in to the case and
request that the documents not be made public, or even that the entire
lawsuit be barred under the seldom-used State Secrets Privilege.
AT&T spokesman Walt Sharp declined to comment on the allegations, citing a
company policy of not commenting on litigation or matters of national
security, but did say that "AT&T follows all laws following requests for
assistance from government authorities."
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70619-0.html
Electronic
Frontier Foundation's lawsuit
http://www.apfn.org/pdf/att-complaint.pdf
Electronic
Frontier Foundation
http://www.eff.org/
AT&T Sued Over NSA
Eavesdropping
By Ryan Singel | Also by this reporter
16:03 PM Jan, 31, 2006 EST
The Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T
on Tuesday, accusing the telecom company of violating federal laws by
collaborating with the government's secret, warrantless wiretapping of
American citizens' phone and internet usage.
The suit (.pdf), filed by the civil
liberties group in federal court in San Francisco, alleges AT&T secretly
gave the National Security Agency access to two massive databases that
included both the contents of its subscribers' communications and detailed
transaction records, such as numbers dialed and internet addresses visited.
"Our goal is to go after the people who are making the government's illegal
surveillance possible," says EFF attorney Kevin Bankston. "They could not do
what they are doing without the help of companies like AT&T. We want to make
it clear to AT&T that it is not in their legal or economic interests to
violate the law whenever the president asks them to."
One of AT&T's databases, known as "Hawkeye," contains 312 terabytes of data
detailing nearly every telephone communication on AT&T's domestic network
since 2001, according to the complaint. The suit also alleges that AT&T
allowed the NSA to use the company's powerful Daytona database-management
software to quickly search this and other communication databases.
That action violates the First and Fourth amendments to the Constitution,
federal wiretapping statutes, telecommunications laws and the Electronic
Communications Privacy Act, according to the complaint.
The suit, which relies on
reporting from the Los Angeles Times, seeks up to $22,000 in damages for
each AT&T customer, plus punitive fines.
AT&T did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit comes a little more than a month after The New York Times
reported that in 2001, President Bush ordered the NSA to begin warrantless
monitoring of Americans' overseas phone calls and internet usage.
The administration defends the eavesdropping program, saying it is only
targeting communications to and from suspected terrorists, that government
lawyers review the program every 45 days and that Congress authorized the
president to track down 9/11 co-conspirators, thereby giving the president
the ability to bypass wiretapping laws.
Some Senate Democrats and Republicans, along with civil libertarians and
former government officials, counter that the wiretaps are simply illegal
and that wiretapping warrants can be acquired easily if the government has
probable cause to believe an American is affiliated with terrorists.
The government is not named in the lawsuit, though it is already being sued
by the American Civil Liberties Union over the surveillance program.
Bankston estimates that millions of people nationwide would be eligible to
join the class action, pushing the possible total fines into the billions.
However, he expects the administration will try to kill the lawsuit by
invoking the rarely used state secrets privilege.
"If state secrecy can prevent us from preserving the rights of millions upon
millions of people, then there is a profound problem with the law," says
Bankston.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70126-0.html
AT&T Seeks to Hide Spy
Docs
By Ryan Singel| Also by this reporter
11:00 AM Apr, 12, 2006
AT&T is seeking the return of technical documents presented in a lawsuit
that allegedly detail how the telecom giant helped the government set up a
massive internet wiretap operation in its San Francisco facilities.
In papers filed late Monday, AT&T argued that confidential technical
documents provided by an ex-AT&T technician to the Electronic Frontier
Foundation shouldn't be used as evidence in the case and should be returned.
The documents, which the EFF filed under a temporary seal last Wednesday,
purportedly detail how AT&T diverts internet traffic to the National
Security Agency via a secret room in San Francisco and allege that such
rooms exist in other AT&T switching centers.
The EFF filed the class-action
lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Northern California in January,
seeking damages from AT&T on behalf of AT&T customers for alleged violation
of state and federal laws.
Mark Klein, a former technician who
worked for AT&T for 22 years, provided three technical documents, totaling
140 pages, to the EFF and to The New York Times, which first reported last
December that the Bush administration was eavesdropping on citizens' phone
calls without obtaining warrants.
Klein issued a
detailed public statement last week, saying he came forward because he
believes the government's extrajudicial spying extended beyond wiretapping
of phone calls between Americans and a party with suspected ties to
terrorists, and included wholesale monitoring of the nation's internet
communications.
AT&T built a secret room in its San Francisco switching station that funnels
internet traffic data from AT&T Worldnet dialup customers and traffic from
AT&T's massive internet backbone to the NSA, according to a statement from
Klein.
Klein's duties included connecting new fiber-optic circuits to that room,
which housed data-mining equipment built by a company called
Narus, according to his statement.
Narus' promotional materials boast that its equipment can scan billions of
bits of internet traffic per second, including analyzing the contents of
e-mails and e-mail attachments and even allowing playback of internet phone
calls.
While AT&T's open filings did not confirm the details of Klein's statement,
they did not dispute the legitimacy of his claims, and the company's filing
included a sealed affidavit attesting to the sensitivity of the documents.
The company asked for a hearing Thursday to determine whether the documents
could be used in the class-action lawsuit, whether they would be unsealed or
whether the EFF would have to return them. The EFF filed a rebuttal, calling
that time frame unworkable and accusing AT&T of not following normal court
rules.
AT&T's lawyers also told the court that intense press coverage surrounding
the case, including Wired News' publication of Klein's statement, was
revealing the company's trade secrets, "causing grave injury to AT&T." The
lawyers argued that unsealing the documents "would cause AT&T great harm and
potentially jeopardize AT&T's network, making it vulnerable to hackers, and
worse."
The EFF filed the documents last week under a temporary seal when it asked
the judge to force AT&T to stop the alleged internet spying until the case
goes to trial.
Klein's statement and documents are the only direct evidence filed so far by
the EFF, and without them its case could be weakened.
It is not clear whether AT&T has served legal papers to Klein.
As of last week, Klein was represented by Miles Ehrlich, who until January
served as a U.S. attorney in San Francisco, prosecuting white-collar crime.
Klein is now also represented by two lawyers from the powerhouse law firm
Morrison & Foerster, including James J. Brosnahan, who is best known for
representing John Walker Lindh, the Marin County, California, man found
fighting for the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The EFF declined to comment on the filing, while AT&T did not return a call
seeking comment. The case is Hepting v. AT&T.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70650-0.html?tw=rss.index
Electronic Privacy
Information Center (EPIC)
EPIC Sues
NSA Over Snooping
11:00 AM Dec, 06, 1999 EST
The Electronic Privacy Information Center
has sued the National Security Agency to force the release of documents
pertaining to alleged NSA surveillance of American citizens.
"The charter of the National Security Agency does not authorize domestic
intelligence gathering," EPIC director Marc Rotenberg said in a statement.
"Yet we have reason to believe that the NSA is engaged in the indiscriminate
acquisition and interception of domestic communications taking place over
the Internet."
In the lawsuit, filed on 3 December in the District Court of the District of
Columbia, the watchdog group asks for public disclosure of internal NSA
documents that discuss the legality of the agency's intelligence activities.
EPIC also plans to evaluate the legal
basis for the interception of citizen communications by the NSA in a study
to be released early next year. That study will be conducted by a Scottish
investigative journalist and TV producer who conducted a similar
investigation for the European Parliament.
The European report said there was evidence of the activity of an
internationally coordinated project known as Echelon. It produced the the
first public documentation of activities akin to a long-suspected global
project that monitors citizen communications around the world.
After the National Security Agency refused to provide legal memoranda on
citizen surveillance to the House Intelligence Committee earlier this year,
Representative Porter Goss (R-Florida), chairman of the oversight panel,
reprimanded the agency.
NSA's rationale for withholding the memos was "unpersuasive and dubious,"
Goss wrote in a committee report in May. He noted that if NSA lawyers
"construed the Agency's authorities too permissively, then the privacy
interests of the citizens of the United States could be at risk."
EPIC's lawsuit follows a previous unsuccessful request to obtain information
from the NSA.
EPIC had submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to NSA for the
surveillance documents shortly after the release of the Intelligence
Committee report. But the NSA never responded to the request, EPIC said.
The Freedoom of Information Act imposes a time limit of 20 working days for
an agency to respond.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,32905,00.html
epic.org
http://www.epic.org/
FOR RELEASE:
Friday, December 3, 1999
LAWSUIT SEEKS MEMOS ON SURVEILLANCE OF AMERICANS;
EPIC LAUNCHES STUDY OF NSA INTERCEPTION ACTIVITIES
WASHINGTON, DC - The Electronic Privacy Information Center
(EPIC) today asked a federal court to order the release of
controversial documents concerning potential government
surveillance of American citizens. EPIC's lawsuit seeks the
public disclosure of internal National Security Agency (NSA)
documents discussing the legality of the agency's intelligence
activities.
NSA refused to provide the documents to the House Intelligence
Committee earlier this year, resulting in an unusual public
reprimand of the secretive spy agency. Rep. Porter J. Goss,
chairman of the oversight panel, wrote in a committee report in
May that NSA's rationale for withholding the legal memoranda was
"unpersuasive and dubious." He noted that if NSA lawyers
"construed the Agency's authorities too permissively, then the
privacy interests of the citizens of the United States could be
at risk." Soon after the release of the Intelligence Committee
report, EPIC submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
request to NSA for the documents. Despite the FOIA's time limit
of 20 working days, the agency has not responded to EPIC's
request.
EPIC Director Marc Rotenberg said "the charter of the National
Security Agency does not authorize domestic intelligence
gathering. Yet we have reason to believe that the NSA is engaged
in the indiscriminate acquisition and interception of domestic
communications taking place over the Internet."
The surveillance activities of the NSA have recently come under
increased scrutiny, with published reports indicating that the
agency is coordinating a massive global interception initiative
known as ECHELON. The current issue of the New Yorker magazine
reports that it took NSA only 11 months to fill three years'
worth of planned storage capacity for intercepted Internet
traffic.
The legal basis for NSA's interception activities is a critical
issue that EPIC plans to evaluate in a comprehensive study to be
released early next year. That study will be conducted by
Duncan Campbell, a Scottish investigative journalist and TV
producer. Earlier this year, Campbell was appointed a
consultant to the European Parliament and prepared a technology
assessment report on ECHELON and communications intelligence
which contained the first public documentary evidence of the
global surveillance system. Campbell will be working with EPIC
as a Senior Research Fellow for several months to produce
a report for presentation at anticipated congressional hearings
on the topic of signals intelligence agencies, the Fourth
Amendment and human rights.
More information on ECHELON is available at the EchelonWatch
website, which is administered by the American Civil Liberties
Union:
http://www.echelonwatch.org
http://www.epic.org/open_gov/foia/nsa_suit_12_99.html
EPIC Sues for NSA
Interception Documents. On December 3, EPIC asked a federal court
to order the release of controversial documents concerning potential
government surveillance of American citizens. EPIC's
lawsuit (PDF) seeks the
public disclosure of internal National Security Agency (NSA) documents
discussing the legality of the agency's intelligence activities. See the
press
release for more details, and EPIC's
Former Secrets
page for examples of other government documents obtained under the Freedom
of Information Act.
FBI's "Carnivore Splash Screen"
Significant New FBI Carnivore Documents Obtained by EPIC (Released
January 14, 2005)
Other FBI Carnivore Documents Obtained by EPIC
(Released May 24, 2002)
Earlier Material
Analysis of Carnivore documents produced by SecurityFocus.
These documents have been released through a lawsuit EPIC filed against
the FBI and the Department of Justice. More information on EPIC's lawsuit is
available at the Carnivore
FOIA Litigation page.
http://www.epic.org/privacy/carnivore/foia_documents.html
#############################
Former Secrets -- Documents
Released Under the FOIA
EPIC makes frequent use of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to
obtain information from the government about cryptography and privacy
policy. Public disclosure of this information improves government
oversight and accountability. It also helps ensure that the public is
fully informed about the activities of government. The following scanned
images (GIFs) are representative of the types of material that EPIC
obtains.
Scanned Images of Key Policy Documents
-
Documents
on the FBI's Carnivore Internet Surveillance System.
- Memo
from Ronald D. Lee, Associate Deputy Attorney General,
Department of Justice to Jeffrey Hunker, Director, Critical
Infrastructure Assurance Office regading the National Information
Systems Protection Plan, March 8, 1999. In this memo, Lee expresses
concern about the legal authority for establishing FIDNET. Another
memo
from Jeffrey Hunker, CIAO to CICG Members regarding "Offsite
Materials" and identification of "suspicious and anomalous behavior"
on the basis of credit card and telephone records.
-
Commerce Department memorandum dated November 1996 in which top
Administration official acknowledges that key-escrow encryption is
"more costly and less efficient" than the alternatives the
government seeks to suppress.
-
White House memorandum from 1991 shows President Bush's support
for the digital telephony and Clipper Chip initiatives, and the
linkage between the two proposals.
- The first
page of Presidential Decision Directive 29, establishing the
secretive Security Policy Board. (Full
text of the directive).
-
The cover page of a heavily censored FBI survey of
"technological problems" that allegedly hamper wiretapping. (See the
EPIC Wiretap Page for more information).
- A
sample page of the FBI wiretap survey.
-
Table of contents for briefing document prepared by FBI, NSA and
DOJ and titled "Encryption: The Threat, Applications, and Potential
Solutions," and an excerpt recommending a
legislative prohibition on non-escrowed encryption. (See the
EPIC Cryptography Policy Archive for more information).
-
Transmittal letter from FBI Director William S. Sessions to
National Security Council official George J. Tenet, forwarding the
FBI/NSA/DOJ above-described briefing document.
-
Cover page of an FBI report titled "Impact of Emerging
Telecommunications Technologies on Law Enforcement." The report is
undated and classified "Secret." An
excerpt
calls for a national policy prohibiting cryptography that does not
ensure real-time access to law enforcement.
-
Title page for an FBI presentation on encryption policy, which
includes a page discussing the need for
domestic regulation and prohibition of cryptography that "cannot
meet [law enforcement's] standard."
-
Cover page of an FBI report titled "Law Enforcement's Diminished
Capability to Conduct Electronic Surveillance." The report is
undated and classified "Confidential."
- A National
Security Agency memorandum concerning NSA's role in the
development of National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 145, a
Presidential directive that prompted Congress to enact the Computer
Security Act of 1987 to limit NSA's role in the development of
civilian security standards. (See the
EPIC Computer Security Act Page for more information).
http://www.epic.org/open_gov/FOIA/secrets.html
############################
On July 11, 2000, the existence of an FBI Internet monitoring
system called "Carnivore" was widely reported. Although the public
details were sketchy, reports indicated that the Carnivore system is
installed at the facilities of an Internet Service Provider (ISP)
and can monitor all traffic moving through that ISP. The FBI claims
that Carnivore "filters" data traffic and delivers to investigators
only those "packets" that they are lawfully authorized to obtain.
Because the details remain secret, the public is left to trust the
FBI's characterization of the system and -- more significantly --
the FBI's compliance with legal requirements.
One day after the initial disclosures, EPIC filed a Freedom of
Information Act (FOIA) request seeking the public release of all FBI
records concerning Carnivore, including the source code, other
technical details, and legal analyses addressing the potential
privacy implications of the technology. On July 18, 2000, after
Carnivore had become a major issue of public concern, EPIC asked the
Justice Department to expedite the processing of its request. When
DOJ failed to respond within the statutory deadline, EPIC filed suit
in U.S. District Court seeking the immediate release of all
information concerning Carnivore.
At an emergency hearing held on August 2, 2000, U.S. District
Judge James Robertson ordered the FBI to report back to the court by
August 16 and to identify the amount of material at issue and the
Bureau's schedule for releasing it. The FBI subsequently reported
that 3000 pages of responsive material were located, but it refused
to commit to a date for the completion of processing.
In late January 2001, the FBI completed its processing of EPIC's
FOIA request. The Bureau revised its earlier estimate and reported
that there were 1756 pages of responsive material; 1502 were
released in part and 254 were withheld in their entirety (see link
below for sample scanned documents).
On August 1, 2001, the FBI moved for summary judgment, asserting
that it fully met its obligations under FOIA. On August 9, 2001,
EPIC filed a motion to stay further proceedings pending discovery,
on the grounds that the FBI has failed to conduct an adequate search
for responsive documents.
On March 25, 2002, the court issued an
order directing the FBI to initiate a new search for
responsive documents. The new search was to be conducted in the
offices of General Counsel and Congressional & Public Affairs, and
be completed no later than May 24, 2002. The documents listed above
were located and released as a result of that court-ordered search.
EPIC Carnivore Documents
Other Resources
http://www.epic.org/privacy/carnivore/
Carnivore Details
Emerge
Kevin Poulsen, SecurityFocus 2000-10-04
A web spying capability, multi-million dollar price tag, and a secret
Carnivore ancestor are some of the details to poke through heavy FBI
editing.
“ Carnivore is remarkably tolerant of network aberration, such a speed
change, data corruption and targeted smurf type attacks. ”
FBI report WASHINGTON--The FBI's Carnivore surveillance tool monitors
more than just email. Newly declassified documents obtained by
Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) under the Freedom of
Information Act reveal that Carnivore can monitor all of a target user's
Internet traffic, and, in conjunction with other FBI tools, can
reconstruct web pages exactly as a surveillance target saw them while
surfing the web. The capability is one of the new details to emerge from
some six-hundred pages of heavily redacted documents given to the
Washington-based nonprofit group this week, and reviewed by
SecurityFocus Wednesday. The documents confirm that Carnivore grew from
an earlier FBI project called Omnivore, but reveal for the first time
that Omnivore itself replaced a still older tool. The name of that
project was carefully blacked out of the documents, and remains
classified "secret." The older surveillance system had "deficiencies
that rendered the design solution unacceptable." The project was
eventually shut down. Development of Omnivore began in February 1997,
and the first prototypes were delivered on October 31st of that year.
The FBI's eagerness to use the system may have slowed its development:
one report notes that it became "difficult to maintain the schedule,"
because the Bureau deployed the nascent surveillance tool for "several
emergency situations" while it was still in beta release. "The field
deployments used development team personnel to support the technical
challenges surrounding the insertion of the OMNIVORE device," reads the
report. The 'Phiple Troenix' Project In September 1998, the FBI network
surveillance lab in Quantico launched a project to move Omnivore from
Sun's Solaris operating system to a Windows NT platform. "This will
facilitate the miniaturization of the system and support a wide range of
personal computer (PC) equipment," notes the project's Statement of
Need. (Other reasons for the switch were redacted from the documents.)
The project was called "Phiple Troenix"--apparently a spoonerism of
"Triple Phoenix," a type of palm tree--and its result was dubbed
"Carnivore." Phiple Troenix's estimated price tag of $800,000 included
training for personnel at the Bureau's Washington-based National
Infrastructure Protection Center (NIPC). Meanwhile, the Omnivore project
was formally closed down in June 1999, with a final cost of $900,000.
Carnivore came out of beta with version 1.2, released in September 1999.
As of May 2000, it was in version 1.3.4. At that time it underwent an
exhaustive series of carefully prescribed tests under a variety of
conditions. The results, according to a memo from the FBI lab, were
positive. "Carnivore is remarkably tolerant of network aberration, such
a speed change, data corruption and targeted smurf type attacks.
The FBI can configure the tool to store all traffic to or from a
particular Internet IP address, while monitoring DHCP and RADIUS
protocols to track a particular user. In "pen mode," in which it
implements a limited type of surveillance not requiring a wiretap
warrant, Carnivore can capture all packet header information for a
targeted user, or zero in on email addresses or FTP login data. Web
Surveillance Version 2.0 will include the ability to display captured
Internet traffic directly from Carnivore. For now, the tool only stores
data as raw packets, and another application called "Packeteer" is later
used to process those packets. A third program called "CoolMiner" uses
Packeteer's output to display and organize the intercepted data.
Collectively, the three applications, Carnivore, Packeteer and CoolMiner,
are referred to by the FBI lab as the "DragonWare suite." The documents
show that in tests, CoolMiner was able to reconstruct HTTP traffic
captured by Carnivore into coherent web pages, a capability that would
allow FBI agents to see the pages exactly as the user saw them while
surfing the web. Justice Department and FBI officials have testified
that Carnivore is used almost exclusively to monitor email, but noted
that it was capable of monitoring messages sent over web-based email
services like Hotmail. An "Enhanced Carnivore" contract began in
November 1999, the papers show, and will run out in January of next year
at a total cost of $650,000. Some of the documents show that the FBI
plans to add yet more features to version 2.0 and 3.0 of the
surveillance tool, but the details are almost entirely redacted. A
document subject to particularly heavy editing shows that the FBI was
interested in voice over IP technology, and was in particular looking at
protocols used by Net2Phone and FreeTel. EPIC attorney David Sobel said
the organization intends to challenge the FBI's editing of the released
documents. In the meantime, EPIC is hurriedly scanning in the pages and
putting them on the web, "so that the official technical review is not
the only one," explained Sobel. "We want an unofficial review with as
wide a range of participants as possible." The FBI's next release of
documents is scheduled for mid-November.
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/97
ACLU sues NSA
"This just in, and I think
it's very exciting: in honor of Martin Luther
King Jr Day, the FBI has just announced that,
just for today, they're going to spy on all
Americans." Jon Stewart, on the
Daily Show (1/16/06)
So, it seems that the FBI has actually been
quite disgruntled with the NSA policy of
widespread domestic surveillance and the vast
quantity of pointless post-9/11 leads that the
Agency was required to follow up on, which have
led to "dead-ends or innocent Americans." In
today's
New York Times article, an unamed official
noted that FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III
has raised questions about "the legal rationale
for a program of eavesdropping without
warrants."
We at the ACLU have a few questions about
this as well, as do Greenpeace, Council on
American-Islamic Relations and five journalists
and scholars
"who frequently communicate by phone and
e-mail with people in the Middle East [and]
believe their communications are being
intercepted by the NSA under the spying
program."
These organizations are the named plaintiffs
in the
ACLU's suit against the NSA, which was
announced today and is profiled in another
New York Times article. The
Center for Constitutional Rights has also
announced that they're bringing a suit against
the NSA, on behalf of "four lawyers at the
center and a legal assistant there who work on
terrorism-related cases at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,
and overseas."
http://aclupa.blogspot.com/2006/01/aclu-sues-nsa.html
|
Verizon
Faces New $20B Suit over NSA Spying Complicity
February 24, 2006
Upping the ante in what may be a high-stakes legal battle, an Upstate
New York lawyer filed a $20 billion class-action lawsuit against Verizon
last week, charging that the company violated customer confidentiality
in aiding warrantless eavesdropping by a federal spy agency.
The civil suit is the second to challenge corporations for helping the
National Security Agency carry out a secret order by the president to
spy on communications between people in the United States and parties
overseas without first obtaining warrants.
The New York Times first revealed the existence of the NSA surveillance
program in December. The Bush administration continues to defend it as a
necessary and permissible tool in the "war on terror," but most legal
scholars who have addressed the matter disagree with the
administration’s interpretation of executive privileges.
In a statement announcing the suit last Friday, lawyer Michael S.
Pascazi in Fishkill, New York called the NSA program "the largest
invasion of privacy ever devised." Citing media reports, Pascazi alleged
that Verizon provided the spy agency with communications records of
customers and non-customers alike, violating consumer trust and numerous
laws. The suit was filed on behalf of all people who have used Verizon
facilities to communicate while the NSA program had access to Verizon’s
databases.
In addition to allowing the NSA to tap into its communications lines,
the suit alleges that Verizon continues to provide "unfettered" access
to its massive databases containing communication records. Pascazi is
asking for $20 billion in damages.
As previously reported by The NewStandard, at the end of January, the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a similar suit against AT&T,
alleging, in part, that the telecommunications giant is acting in
"collaboration" with the NSA in what EFF lawyer Kevin Bankston termed
"the biggest fishing expedition ever devised."
The two lawsuits join parallel efforts by three groups seeking court
orders to halt the program. Shortly after the surveillance efforts were
revealed, the American Civil Liberties Union, Electronic Privacy
Information Clearinghouse and Center for Constitutional Rights filed
separate suits against the administration.
http://newstandardnews.net/content/index.cfm/items/2855
CCR Files Suit
over NSA Domestic Spying Program
Center for Constitutional
Rights Believes Privileged Attorney-Client Communications Were
Intercepted by NSA without Warrants
In New York, on January 17, 2006, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR)
filed a lawsuit against President George W. Bush, the head of the
National Security Agency (NSA), and the heads of the other major
security agencies, challenging the NSA’s surveillance of persons within
the United States without judicial approval or statutory authorization.
The suit seeks an injunction that would prohibit the government from
conducting warrantless surveillance of communications in the U.S. CCR
filed the suit in the Federal District Court for the Southern District
of New York on its own behalf and on behalf of CCR attorneys and legal
staff representing clients who fit the criteria described by the
Attorney General for targeting under the NSA Surveillance Program.
As has been widely reported, for over four years the NSA, with the
approval of the president, has engaged in a program of widespread
warrantless electronic surveillance of telephone calls and emails in
violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The suit
argues that the NSA Surveillance Program violates a clear criminal law,
exceeds the president's authority under Article II of the Constitution,
and violates the First and Fourth Amendments. The Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act explicitly authorizes foreign intelligence electronic
surveillance only upon orders issued by federal judges on a special
court. It expressly authorizes warrantless wiretapping only for the
first fifteen days of a war, and makes it a crime to engage in
wiretapping without specific statutory authority. Rather than seeking to
amend this statute, the president simply violated it by authorizing
warrantless wiretapping of Americans without statutory authority or
court approval. As a result, the President violated his oath of office
to take care that the laws of this nation are faithfully executed, and
instead secretly violated a criminal prohibition duly enacted by
Congress.
CCR has been one of the most active opponents of the illegal detention,
torture and intelligence gathering practices this administration
instituted in the wake of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. As part of its
mission to fight violations of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution,
the Center for Constitutional Rights represents hundreds of men detained
indefinitely without charge as "enemy combatants" at Guantanamo Bay;
Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen accused of al Qaeda ties and rendered
from the United States to Syria for the purpose of being tortured; and
Muslim immigrants unreasonably and wrongfully detained in the U.S. for
months without probable cause or criminal charges in the wake of 9/11.
In the course of representing these clients, the Center's lawyers have
engaged in innumerable telephone calls and e-mails with people outside
the United States, including their clients, their clients' families and
outside lawyers, potential witnesses, and others. Given that the
government has accused many of CCR's overseas clients of being
associated with Al Qaeda or of interest to the 9/11 investigation, there
is little question that these attorneys have been subject to the NSA
Surveillance Program. The Center filed today's lawsuit in order to
protect CCR attorneys' right to represent their clients free of unlawful
and unchecked surveillance.
CCR Legal Director Bill Goodman said, "On this, the day following Martin
Luther King Day, we are saddened that the illegal electronic
surveillance that once targeted that great American has again become
characteristic of our present government. As was the case with Dr. King,
this illegal activity is cloaked in the guise of national security. In
reality, it reflects an attempt by the Bush Administration to exercise
unchecked power without the inconvenient interference of the other
co-equal branches of government."
According to CCR attorney Shayana Kadidal, "The mere existence of the
program harms CCR and our attorneys because it serves to inhibit their
ability to institute and effectively litigate these suits."
The Center for Constitutional Rights is represented in the suit by CCR
attorneys Bill Goodman, Shayana Kadidal, and Michael Ratner, and CCR
cooperating attorney David Cole. Also appearing as an attorney for CCR,
is Professor Michael Avery, president of the National Lawyers Guild
(NLG), on behalf of the NLG.
http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/report.asp?ObjID=IahVzRA3n9&Content=693
############################
CCR Files Suit over NSA Domestic Spying Program
Center for Constitutional Rights Believes Privileged Attorney-Client
Communications Were Intercepted by NSA without Warrants
In New York, on January 17, 2006, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR)
filed a lawsuit against President George W. Bush, the head of the
National Security Agency (NSA), and the heads of the other major
security agencies, challenging the NSA’s surveillance of persons within
the United States without judicial approval or statutory authorization.
The suit seeks an injunction that would prohibit the government from
conducting warrantless surveillance of communications in the U.S. CCR
filed the suit in the Federal District Court for the Southern District
of New York on its own behalf and on behalf of CCR attorneys and legal
staff representing clients who fit the criteria described by the
Attorney General for targeting under the NSA Surveillance Program.
As has been widely reported, for over four years the NSA, with the
approval of the president, has engaged in a program of widespread
warrantless electronic surveillance of telephone calls and emails in
violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The suit
argues that the NSA Surveillance Program violates a clear criminal law,
exceeds the president's authority under Article II of the Constitution,
and violates the First and Fourth Amendments. The Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act explicitly authorizes foreign intelligence electronic
surveillance only upon orders issued by federal judges on a special
court. It expressly authorizes warrantless wiretapping only for the
first fifteen days of a war, and makes it a crime to engage in
wiretapping without specific statutory authority. Rather than seeking to
amend this statute, the president simply violated it by authorizing
warrantless wiretapping of Americans without statutory authority or
court approval. As a result, the President violated his oath of office
to take care that the laws of this nation are faithfully executed, and
instead secretly violated a criminal prohibition duly enacted by
Congress.
CCR has been one of the most active opponents of the illegal detention,
torture and intelligence gathering practices this administration
instituted in the wake of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. As part of its
mission to fight violations of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution,
the Center for Constitutional Rights represents hundreds of men detained
indefinitely without charge as "enemy combatants" at Guantanamo Bay;
Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen accused of al Qaeda ties and rendered
from the United States to Syria for the purpose of being tortured; and
Muslim immigrants unreasonably and wrongfully detained in the U.S. for
months without probable cause or criminal charges in the wake of 9/11.
In the course of representing these clients, the Center's lawyers have
engaged in innumerable telephone calls and e-mails with people outside
the United States, including their clients, their clients' families and
outside lawyers, potential witnesses, and others. Given that the
government has accused many of CCR's overseas clients of being
associated with Al Qaeda or of interest to the 9/11 investigation, there
is little question that these attorneys have been subject to the NSA
Surveillance Program. The Center filed today's lawsuit in order to
protect CCR attorneys' right to represent their clients free of unlawful
and unchecked surveillance.
CCR Legal Director Bill Goodman said, "On this, the day following Martin
Luther King Day, we are saddened that the illegal electronic
surveillance that once targeted that great American has again become
characteristic of our present government. As was the case with Dr. King,
this illegal activity is cloaked in the guise of national security. In
reality, it reflects an attempt by the Bush Administration to exercise
unchecked power without the inconvenient interference of the other
co-equal branches of government."
According to CCR attorney Shayana Kadidal, "The mere existence of the
program harms CCR and our attorneys because it serves to inhibit their
ability to institute and effectively litigate these suits."
The Center for Constitutional Rights is represented in the suit by CCR
attorneys Bill Goodman, Shayana Kadidal, and Michael Ratner, and CCR
cooperating attorney David Cole. Also appearing as an attorney for CCR,
is Professor Michael Avery, president of the National Lawyers Guild
(NLG), on behalf of the NLG.
NSA Complaint (PDF)150KB
http://www.apfn.org/pdf/NSAcomplaintFINAL11706.pdf
CRS Report: Authorization of Military Force in
Response to September 11th Attacks: A Legislative History (PDF)42Kb
http://www.apfn.org/pdf/NSA_CRS_Memo2.pdf
CSR Report: Presidential Authority to Conduct
Warrantless Electronic Surveillance to Gather Foreign Intelligence
Information (PDF)380Kb
http://www.apfn.org/pdf/NSA_CRS_Memo1.pdf
http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/legal/govt_misconduct/govtArticle.asp?ObjID=RovrtPD8Bc&Content=694
April 13, 2006
AOL Censors Email Tax Opponents
Won’t Deliver Emails Mentioning
www.DearAOL.com
UPDATE After this press release was
sent out Thursday afternoon, AOL stopped blocking
email with links to
www.DearAOL.com . Officials at the company
stated that problems of this nature generally take
three to five working days to fix. However, this was
fixed after 24 hours of undeliverability - and
approximately twenty minutes after this press
release was widely distributed. This incident only
increases our worry about organizations who don't
have the ability to seek instant press attention.
The next time AOL's anti-spam filters fail for a
small organization – or one without political muscle
– will they move so quickly to fix them? Or will
they push organizations to just sign up with
Goodmail and pay to avoid the problem?
San Francisco - AOL is blocking delivery to AOL
customers of all emails that include a link to
www.DearAOL.com.
Today, over 100 people who signed a petition to AOL
tried sending messages to their AOL-using friends,
and received a bounce-back message informing them
that their email "failed permanently."
"The fact is, ISPs like AOL commonly make these
kinds of arbitrary decisions – silently banning huge
swathes of legitimate mail on the flimsiest of
reasons – every day, and no one hears about it,"
said Danny O'Brien, Activism Coordinator of the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). "AOL's planned
CertifiedEmail system would let them profit from
this power by offering to charge legitimate mailers
to bypass these malfunctioning filters."
After reports of undelivered email started
rolling in to the DearAOL.com Coalition, MoveOn
co-founder Wes Boyd decided to see for himself if it
was true.
"I tried to email my brother-in-law about
DearAOL.com and AOL sent me a response as if he had
disappeared," said Boyd. "But when I sent him an
email without the DearAOL.com link, it went right
through."
While AOL may imply that censoring
www.DearAOL.com is part of some anti-spam effort,
their own customers are witnessing how faulty AOL's
spam measures would be if that were the case.
"I forwarded www.DearAOL.com to my own AOL
account and it was censored. Apparently I can't even
tell myself about it," said Kelly Tessitore from
Framingham, Massachusetts.
"This proves the DearAOL.com Coalition's point
entirely: left to their own devices, AOL will always
put its own self-interest ahead of the public
interest in a free and open Internet," said Timothy
Karr, campaign director of Free Press, a national,
nonpartisan organization working on media reform and
Internet policy issues. "AOL wants us to believe
they won't hurt free email when their pay-to-send
system is up and running. But if AOL is willing to
censor the flow of information now to silence their
critics, how could anyone trust that they will
preserve the free and open Internet down the road?
Their days of saying 'trust us' are over – their
credibility is zero, zip, nada."
The DearAOL.com Coalition represents over 15
million people combined – and has grown from 50
member organizations to 600 in a month. Since the
beginning of the DearAOL.com campaign, more than
350,000 Internet users have signed letters to AOL
opposing its pay to send proposal. Coalition members
include craigslist founder Craig Newmark, the
Association of Cancer Online Resources, EFF, Free
Press, the AFL-CIO, MoveOn.org Civic Action, Gun
Owners of America, and others.
For more on the issues surrounding pay-to-send
email, join EFF for a debate on April 20 in San
Francisco. EFF's O'Brien and tech expert Esther
Dyson will face off over the question "Email -
Should the Sender Pay?" Entrepreneur Mitch Kapor
will moderate.
More information about the DearAOL.com Coalition:
http://www.dearaol.com
More information on next week's debate:
http://www.eff.org/bayff/aolmail_debate.php
Contacts:
Danny O'Brien
Activism Coordinator
Electronic Frontier Foundation
danny@eff.org
Rebecca Jeschke
Media Coordinator
Electronic Frontier Foundation
press@eff.org
Digital Copyright Law Hurts
Consumers, Scientists, and Competition
EFF Report Highlights More Unintended
Consequences in Seven Years of DMCA
San Francisco - In the seven years since Congress
enacted the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA),
examples of the law's impact on legitimate
consumers, scientists, and competitors continue to
mount. A new report released today from the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), "Unintended
Consequences: Seven Years Under the DMCA," collects
reports of the misuses of the DMCA -- chilling free
expression and scientific research, jeopardizing
fair use, impeding competition and innovation, and
interfering with other laws on the books. The report
updates a previous version issued by EFF in 2003.
The report tells the story of the delay of the
disclosure of the Sony BMG "rootkit" vulnerabilities
on millions of music CDs. The dangerous software
flaws were initially discovered by Princeton
graduate student J. Alex Halderman. But Halderman
delayed sounding the alarm about the security
problems for several weeks so he could consult with
lawyers about potential violations of the DMCA. The
report also details the DMCA's role in impeding
RealNetworks from selling digital music to Apple
iPod owners, along with other unintended
consequences from the DMCA.
"Rather than being used to stop 'piracy,' the
DMCA has predominantly been used to threaten and sue
legitimate consumers, scientists, publishers, and
competitors," said EFF senior staff attorney Fred
von Lohmann. "This law is not being used as Congress
intended, and a review of the past seven years makes
it clear that reform is needed."
For "Unintended Consequences: Seven Years Under
the DMCA":
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/?f=unintended_consequences.html
For more on EFF and the DMCA:
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/
Contact:
Fred von Lohmann
Senior Intellectual Property Attorney
Electronic Frontier Foundation
fred@eff.org
April 06, 2006
EFF Files Evidence in Motion to
Stop AT&T's Dragnet Surveillance
Internal AT&T Documents Had Been Temporarily Held
Back Due To Government's Concerns
San Francisco - The Electronic Frontier
Foundation (EFF) on Wednesday filed the legal briefs
and evidence supporting its motion for a preliminary
injunction in its class-action lawsuit against AT&T.
After asking EFF to hold back the documents so that
it could review them, the Department of Justice
consented to EFF's filing them under seal -- a
well-established procedure that prohibits public
access and permits only the judge and the litigants
to see the evidence. While not a party to the case,
the government was concerned that even this
procedure would not provide sufficient security and
has represented to the Court that it is "presently
considering whether and, if so, how it will
participate in this case."
"The evidence that we are filing supports our
claim that AT&T is diverting Internet traffic into
the hands of the NSA wholesale, in violation of
federal wiretapping laws and the Fourth Amendment,"
said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. "More than
just threatening individuals' privacy, AT&T's
apparent choice to give the government secret,
direct access to millions of ordinary Americans'
Internet communications is a threat to the
Constitution itself. We are asking the Court to put
a stop to it now."
EFF's evidence regarding AT&T's dragnet
surveillance of its networks includes a declaration
by Mark Klein, a retired AT&T telecommunications
technician, and several internal AT&T documents.
This evidence was bolstered and explained by the
expert opinion of J. Scott Marcus, who served as
Senior Advisor for Internet Technology to the
Federal Communications Commission from July 2001
until July 2005.
The internal AT&T documents and portions of the
supporting declarations have been submitted to the
Court under a tentative seal, a procedure that
allows AT&T five court days to explain to the Court
why the information should be kept from the public.
"The public deserves to know about AT&T's illegal
program," said EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn. "In an
abundance of caution, we are providing AT&T with an
opportunity to explain itself before this material
goes on the public docket, but we believe that
justice will ultimately require full disclosure."
The NSA program came to light in December, when
the New York Times reported that the President had
authorized the agency to intercept telephone and
Internet communications inside the United States
without the authorization of any court. Over the
ensuing weeks, it became clear that the NSA program
has been intercepting and analyzing millions of
Americans' communications, with the help of the
country's largest phone and Internet companies,
including AT&T.
"Mark Klein is a true American hero," said EFF
Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl. "He has bravely come
forward with information critical for proving AT&T's
involvement with the government's invasive
surveillance program."
In the lawsuit, EFF is representing the class of
all AT&T residential customers nationwide. Working
with EFF in the lawsuit are the law firms Traber &
Voorhees, Lerach Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman &
Robbins LLP and the Law Office of Richard R. Wiebe.
For the notice of motion for preliminary
injunction:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/NotMot.pdf
For the motion to lodge under temporary seal:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/MotionReSealing.pdf
For more on EFF's suit:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/
Contacts:
Derek Slater
Acting Media Coordinator
Electronic Frontier Foundation
derek@eff.org
For Mark Klein:
Miles Ehrlich, Esq.
Ramsey & Ehrlich
miles@ramsey-ehrlich.com
[Note, 04/07 - J. Scott Marcus' title corrected.]
http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2006_04.php#004538
|
Just click "search" for more information on NSA Spying:
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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/internet_spying.htm
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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/treason_5.htm
Carnivore FOIA Documents
http://www.epic.org/privacy/carnivore/foia_documents.html
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George Orwell's 1984
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/1984.htm
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http://www.apfn.net/pogo.htm
Citizen's Rule Book 44 pages
Download here:
http://www.apfn.org/pdf/citizen.pdf
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PROFILING
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Get That Gold Fringe Off My Flag
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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/phenry.htm
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http://apfn.org/apfn/camps.htm
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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/secretoath.htm
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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/secretcourts.htm
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http://ww.apfn.org/apfn/policestate.htm
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http://ww.apfn.org/apfn/un.htm
The United Nations plans to CONFISCATE your profit and ---.
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/united_nations.htm
Government has its eye on your money !
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/gov_eye.htm
It's Time to Circle The Wagons
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While the sheep are sleeping, the predators move in.
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GLOBE BUSH'S-SECRET-BREAKDOWN
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