California Can Cripple the NSA By Passing This One Law A team of California state senators from both sides of the aisle introduced a bill on Monday that would ban the state and its localities from providing "material support" — access to water and electricity — to National Security Agency (NSA) facilities in a symbolic effort to thwart the agency's surveillance activities. "State-funded public resources should not be going toward aiding the NSA or any other federal agency from indiscriminate spying on its own citizens and gathering electronic or metadata that violates the Fourth Amendment," the bill's co-author California state Sen. Ted Lieu, said in a statement. If the bill becomes law, private companies will be sanctioned to provide the NSA with these essential utility services. Lieu added that the NSA's surveillance programs pose "a clear and present danger to our liberties." Republican state Sen. Sen. Source: Facebook Sen. Source: Facebook Offnow activists are also working to turn off the NSA's "Achilles heel." Victoria Kim
Here’s why Obama trade negotiators push the interests of Hollywood and drug companies At least a dozen officials have moved from USTR to industry groups since the turn of the century. (Elliott Brown) Earlier this month, the transparency organization WikiLeaks leaked the "intellectual property" chapter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement that is being negotiated in secret by Pacific Rim nations. The draft text showed that the positions taken by U.S. negotiators largely mirrored the provisions of U.S. law, but the U.S. negotiating position also had an unmistakeable bias toward expanding the rights of copyright and patent holders. Those positions are great for Hollywood and the pharmaceutical industry, but it's not obvious that they are in the interests of the broader U.S. economy. Two major factors contribute to the USTR's strong pro-rightsholder slant. A more subtle factor is the structure and culture of USTR itself. USTR's enthusiasm for stronger copyright and patent protections could become a liability for the Obama administration's broader trade agenda.
America’s Black-Ops Blackout: Unraveling the Secrets of the Military’s Secret Military January 12th, 2014 11:14 AM By Nick Turse Crossposted from TomDispatch “Dude, I don’t need to play these stupid games. I know what you’re trying to do.” With that, Major Matthew Robert Bockholt hung up on me. More than a month before, I had called U.S. And for more than a month, I waited for answers. Then, at the last moment, just before my filing deadline, Special Operations Command got back to me with an answer so incongruous, confusing, and contradictory that I was glad I had given up on SOCOM and tried to figure things out for myself. Click here to see a larger version U.S. I started with a blank map that quickly turned into a global pincushion. A review of open source information reveals that in 2012 and 2013, U.S. Despite the lack of official cooperation, an analysis by TomDispatch reveals SOCOM to be a command on the make with an already sprawling reach. The Rise of the Military’s Secret Military In the post-9/11 era, the command has grown steadily. The Global SOF Network U.S.
NSA Bombshell Shocks Former Spooks: "Why in The World Would We Burn Google?" Former intelligence officials and technology industry executives reacted with anger and anxiety over the latest revelations that the National Security Agency is reportedly infiltrating some of the world's biggest technology companies and making off with the private communications of millions of their customers. And if the reports are accurate, it could be very bad news for U.S. technology companies, who have been complaining for months that their government's secretive intelligence operations are threatening their business and driving customers towards their foreign competitors. "I think they're in an almost impossible situation," Rep. Adam Schiff, a senior member of the Intelligence Committee, told The Cable. Speaking of Silicon Valley firms who are obligated to cooperate with the NSA, Schiff said recent leak revelations threatened to negatively impact their bottom lines. "Why in the world would we burn a relationship with Google by breaking into a data center?"
Unitarian Church, Gun Groups Join EFF to Sue NSA Over Illegal Surveillance San Francisco - Nineteen organizations including Unitarian church groups, gun ownership advocates, and a broad coalition of membership and political advocacy organizations filed suit against the National Security Agency (NSA) today for violating their First Amendment right of association by illegally collecting their call records. The coalition is represented by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a group with years of experience fighting illegal government surveillance in the courts. "The First Amendment protects the freedom to associate and express political views as a group, but the NSA's mass, untargeted collection of Americans' phone records violates that right by giving the government a dramatically detailed picture into our associational ties," said EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn. "Who we call, how often we call them, and how long we speak shows the government what groups we belong to or associate with, which political issues concern us, and our religious affiliation.
Engelhardt, You Are Our Secret [Note for TomDispatch Readers: Thank you for the donations that have already come in for signed copies of Rebecca Solnit’s spectacular new “memoir” -- it’s actually so much more! -- The Faraway Nearby. For the many Solnit fans among you, don’t miss the chance to have a personalized copy of her new book in return for a $100 (or more) donation to this site. Your help really does keep TomDispatch above the waves and is unbelievably appreciated. The Making of a Global Security State The Five Uncontrollable Urges of a Secrecy-Surveillance World By Tom Engelhardt As happens with so much news these days, the Edward Snowden revelations about National Security Agency (NSA) spying and just how far we’ve come in the building of a surveillance state have swept over us 24/7 -- waves of leaks, videos, charges, claims, counterclaims, skullduggery, and government threats. 1. Today, that "community" seeks to put not just the U.S., but the world fully under its penetrating gaze. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Eric Holder Pressed On DEA, NSA By John Shiffman WASHINGTON, Aug 26 (Reuters) - Eight Democratic U.S. senators and congressmen have asked Attorney General Eric Holder to answer questions about a Reuters report that the National Security Agency supplies the Drug Enforcement Administration with intelligence information used to make non-terrorism cases against American citizens. The August report revealed that a secretive DEA unit passes the NSA information to agents in the field, including those from the Internal Revenue Service, the FBI and Homeland Security, with instructions to never disclose the original source, even in court. In most cases, the NSA tips involve drugs, money laundering and organized crime, not terrorism. Five Democrats in the Senate and three senior Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee submitted questions to Holder about the NSA-DEA relationship, joining two prominent Republicans who have expressed concerns. Holder, an appointee of U.S. Also on HuffPost:
The Consequences of CISPA's Broad Legal Immunity CISPA, the cyberspying bill, is back in Congress and plagued with many of the same problems as last year—vague definitions and the grim government access loophole to name just a few. The bill also grants broad immunity to companies as long as a company acts in "good faith." One section of the immunity clause even grants immunity for any "decision made" based on information about a perceived threat. The clause opens up a wide door for abuse and is yet another reason why we urge users to stop CISPA. Immunity Should Not Cover Any Decisions Made The most dangerous section grants immunity for any "decision" a company makes based on information it learns about a perceived network threat. The requirement that companies act in good faith is an ineffective check on CISPA power grant. It also opens the door for government abuse. This was precisely the problem with the FISA Amendment Act (FAA), which granted retroactive immunity to telecoms for the NSA warrantless wiretapping program.
La lucidez de Saramago En el 2004, el novelista José Saramago vino a Bogotá y discutió ante una audiencia entusiasta la novela que acababa de publicar: Ensayo sobre la lucidez. Esta obra es una parábola política, que describe un país dominado por un aparato más o menos omnipotente, en la que los medios de comunicación, los políticos y los grandes poderes económicos logran manipular a la población para que vote y mantenga vivas las apariencias de una democracia que no puede expresar los intereses reales de la gente. De pronto, sin planeación previa, sin que nadie lo proponga, sin partidos ni movimientos políticos que organicen un gesto de rebelión, sin organización, sin ponerse de acuerdo, el 83 por ciento de los electores vota en blanco. Esta idea se basaba en su convicción de que el poder económico es el que controla el mundo de la política y el mundo de las comunicaciones, y se manifestaba en su percepción de los nuevos medios de comunicación. Jorge Orlando Melo Publicado en El Tiempo, 24 de junio de 2010
There's a Secret Patriot Act, Senator Says | Danger Room You think you understand how the Patriot Act allows the government to spy on its citizens. Sen. Ron Wyden says it’s worse than you know. Congress is set to reauthorize three controversial provisions of the surveillance law as early as Thursday. Wyden (D-Oregon) says that powers they grant the government on their face, the government applies a far broader legal interpretation — an interpretation that the government has conveniently classified, so it cannot be publicly assessed or challenged. But one prominent Patriot-watcher asserts that the secret interpretation empowers the government to deploy “dragnets” for massive amounts of information on private citizens; the government portrays its data-collection efforts much differently. “We’re getting to a gap between what the public thinks the law says and what the American government secretly thinks the law says,” Wyden told Danger Room in an interview in his Senate office. What exactly does Wyden mean by that? Site: Oregon.gov See Also:
New Bill Helps Expand Public Access to Scientific Knowledge Internet users around the world got a Valentine's Day present yesterday in the form of new legislation that requires U.S. government agencies to improve public access to federally funded research. The proposed mandate, called the Fair Access to Science & Technology Research Act, or FASTR (PDF), is simple. Agencies like the National Science Foundation, which invests millions of taxpayer dollars in scientific research every year, must design and implement a plan to facilitate public access to—and robust reuse of—the results of that investment. The contours of the plans are equally simple: researchers who receive funding from most federal agencies must submit a copy of any resulting journal articles to the funding agency, which will then make that research freely available to the world within six months. The proposed changes reflect but also improve upon National Institutes of Health’s public access policy. The bill isn't perfect.
‘Deep cold storage’ vault created for virtual currency bitcoin Published time: January 11, 2014 13:27 Edited time: January 13, 2014 12:09 Photo from www.casascius.com A company in London has created a bank vault to cater for the virtual currency, bitcoin. The futuristic bank is offering so-called “deep cold storage” to protect the cyber money from hack attacks. The idea of making a vault for a virtual company may seem absurd, but the creators of the Elliptic Vault in London claim they have cornered the market in bitcoin banking. At present, no form of insurance exists to cover the cyber currency, so once they are gone there is no way of retrieving them. Carelessness can also lead to the loss of bitcoins. The Elliptic Vault will use private encrypted keys to bitcoins which will be stored in offline servers. Marc Warne, the founder of the UK-based bitcoin purchase site, Bittylicious, told The Telegraph that the new vault would greatly benefit those with large bitcoin fortunes.
Is Edward Snowden a Hero? A Debate with Journalist Chris Hedges & Law Scholar Geoffrey Stone This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form. NERMEEN SHAIKH: We turn now to a debate on Edward Snowden’s decision to leak a trove of secret documents outlining the NSA’s surveillance program. In an interview with The Guardian newspaper, Snowden described why he risked his career to leak the documents. EDWARD SNOWDEN: I think that the public is owed an explanation of the motivations behind the people who make these disclosures that are outside of the democratic model. NERMEEN SHAIKH: Edward Snowden’s actions have elicited a range of reactions. AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, Douglas Rushkoff wrote on CNN, quote, "Snowden is a hero because he realized [that] our very humanity was being compromised by the blind implementation of machines in the name of making us safe," unquote. For more, we host a debate on Edward Snowden. And in Chicago, Illinois, we’re joined by Geoffrey Stone, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School. AMY GOODMAN: Chris Hedges, your response? REP.