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It's always a tradeoff between privacy and security. The rules behind the use of the metadata are pretty stringent. For example: Metadata is JUST number +

by rtpg 13y ago

It's always a tradeoff between privacy and security. The rules behind the use of the metadata are pretty stringent. For example: Metadata is JUST number + duration. Not localtion, cell phone tower... targetting cannot be done on citizens or permanent citizens, or people in the US. Permanent citizen in Madrid is safe. No "reverse" targetting(targetting foreigner but really interested in US nat'l) if citizen/perm. res accidentally targeted, info not used, FISA court signalled, house intel + judiciary signalled. If targeted person is initially out of US, but venture in, targeting stops IMMEDIATELY. Info accidentally gotten (for example, lag when stopping of the targetting mentioned previously), ineligible info is purged. All ineligible info is purged. All targeting is reviewed beforehand , both by DNI and judiciary. All targets are audited Plus this was used on less than 300 numbers. 20 people in the world have access to the info. The justification procedures are stringent. This hearing restored some confidence in checks and balances. And a good point by Deputy AG Cole: This is for foreign surveillance ONLY. There used to be no oversight for foreign surveillance. Now there is through FISA Court and this second court order with all these rules in it. Also, NSA can't listen to the calls without fixed warrant, and the brothers were in the US at the time of planning their thing, so out of NSA jurisdiction anyways.

codeulike 13y ago
Whats your source for those quotes? Is that from the hearing happening now?
- dthunt 13y ago
  This stuff sometime around like minute 45 or thereabouts. I'm frustrated by them asking the wrong questions to the wrong people. They should be asking FBI about listening to Americans' phone calls. They're not dong it, in the bits I've heard, yet. Edit: FBI did chime in on reading emails in real-time, indicating FISA court as the means for doing so, but nothing else I heard. (~1:28?) Edit2: Grunt. I clearly don't understand what's going on here. (~1:42). I'm just going to shut up for another couple days and see what the Guardian releases in response.
  - CaptJax 13y ago
    I haven't been able to follow the hearing from my desk, but I'm curious if anyone asked why the NSA director lied to Congress. Moreover, there were many questions prefaced with "Under these two programs..." These are the programs that have been made public. Who knows what they're running that is not public.
    - declan 13y ago
      Correct. This is the same kind of very narrow denial that we saw under the Bush-era warrantless wiretapping programs as well. There are multiple programs.
- rtpg 13y ago
  All this info is stuff I wrote down during the presentation, yeah. It'll probably show up in a condensed form soon after the end of this.
LoganCale 13y ago
> Plus this was used on less than 300 numbers. The metadata is still collected and presumably stored for all, they just escalated it to additional surveillance for 300 numbers. > 20 people in the world have access to the info. [citation needed] Keith Alexander today said they have 1000 sysadmins like Snowden, most contractors. Snowden said, and the other NSA whistleblowers confirmed, that a sysadmin at the NSA has access to all data with little to no restrictions. > This is for foreign surveillance ONLY. And how do they determine whether or not it's foreign or domestic? Surely they must analyze content in order to be sure?
- rtpg 13y ago
  What was said in the conference: they look at the number, if the number is foreign, it's good. If there's an error and the number is US (for example, a clerical error) the query results are IMMEDIATELY destroyed, and this event is reported to subcommittees and FISA court. The metadata is collected, destroyed after 5 years, but cannot be queried except under the stringent circumstances. So it's basically if they could just go "back in time" on looking at certain phone numbers. and the 20 people is in the conference. Alexander said that 20 analysts and 2 managers (himself and Inglis) are the only people with access to this database.
  - LoganCale 13y ago
    > they look at the number, if the number is foreign, it's good. If there's an error and the number is US (for example, a clerical error) the query results are IMMEDIATELY destroyed, and this event is reported to subcommittees and FISA court. They've also said they are not allowed to monitor U.S. citizens living abroad. What if they have a number outside the U.S. How do they detect that a number belongs to a U.S. citizen or resident? If a non-U.S. person has a phone number from the U.S. but they are not a citizen/resident and are not inside the U.S., is that protected or not? > The metadata is collected, destroyed after 5 years, but cannot be queried except under the stringent circumstances. That seems to contradict what they also said today, that no court order is required to query the database and it just requires reasonable suspicion on the part of the analyst. > Alexander said that 20 analysts and 2 managers (himself and Inglis) are the only people with access to this database. Is that technical access or legal access? In other words, are there technical limitations preventing anyone but those 22 people from accessing the data, or is everyone else just not supposed to? If they have sysadmins managing the databases, surely they have access too, as Snowden and Binney have both said?
marknutter 13y ago
The issue isn't the use of this content, it's the collection of the content. I don't think anyone would have an issue with the NSA collecting and storing data on specific targets after receiving a court order to do so. What people are taking issue with is the collection and storing of data on innocent civilians without a court order, to be used in the event they receive a court order. What makes this collection worse is that apparently low-level government contractors like Edward Snowden can access this vast pool of data, whether or not approved to do so. It's the equivalent of having the US Postal Service open and photocopy every single piece of mail that goes through their system to be stored in a database and used later by NSA/FBI/CIA analysts who have received the proper court order to do so.
- rtpg 13y ago
  Snowden can't access the data , according to this testimony. I don't have that much of a problem with this because the warrant is needed in order to actually do anything with the information. Also, to be precise, it's more as if the USPS scan the mail sender/receiver info (metadata after all). No content.
  - LoganCale 13y ago
    They confirmed that a court order is not needed to query the database, only the reasonable suspicion of an analyst.
    - ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
      which Snowden says is also barely audited
  - betterunix 13y ago
    "Snowden can't access the data , according to this testimony." How do they stop him? It sounds like "can't access the data" means "the rules say he cannot access it, and if he is caught he'll get in trouble." Given that the people we are talking about think in terms of "the least untruthful statement" they can make, I would demand as much detail as possible. "I don't have that much of a problem with this because the warrant is needed in order to actually do anything with the information." Today a warrant is needed. Tomorrow, maybe not. What if tomorrow, the law changes, and the government starts hunting down anyone with leftist leanings? The first thing they'll do is query the database. Laws are not sacred. Laws can be ignored or changed at any time. When we have to worry that the list of people we speak with today might be used against us tomorrow, there is a chilling effect on free speech. That is the danger of these databases. It is not enough that the data is held but can only be touched with a warrant; the data should not exist without a warrant.

by rtpg 13y ago

codeulike 13y ago

Whats your source for those quotes? Is that from the hearing happening now?

dthunt 13y ago
This stuff sometime around like minute 45 or thereabouts. I'm frustrated by them asking the wrong questions to the wrong people. They should be asking FBI about listening to Americans' phone calls. They're not dong it, in the bits I've heard, yet. Edit: FBI did chime in on reading emails in real-time, indicating FISA court as the means for doing so, but nothing else I heard. (~1:28?) Edit2: Grunt. I clearly don't understand what's going on here. (~1:42). I'm just going to shut up for another couple days and see what the Guardian releases in response.
- CaptJax 13y ago
  I haven't been able to follow the hearing from my desk, but I'm curious if anyone asked why the NSA director lied to Congress. Moreover, there were many questions prefaced with "Under these two programs..." These are the programs that have been made public. Who knows what they're running that is not public.
  - declan 13y ago
    Correct. This is the same kind of very narrow denial that we saw under the Bush-era warrantless wiretapping programs as well. There are multiple programs.
rtpg 13y ago
All this info is stuff I wrote down during the presentation, yeah. It'll probably show up in a condensed form soon after the end of this.

LoganCale 13y ago

> Plus this was used on less than 300 numbers. The metadata is still collected and presumably stored for all, they just escalated it to additional surveillance for 300 numbers. > 20 people in the world have access to the info. [citation needed] Keith Alexander today said they have 1000 sysadmins like Snowden, most contractors. Snowden said, and the other NSA whistleblowers confirmed, that a sysadmin at the NSA has access to all data with little to no restrictions. > This is for foreign surveillance ONLY. And how do they determine whether or not it's foreign or domestic? Surely they must analyze content in order to be sure?

rtpg 13y ago
What was said in the conference: they look at the number, if the number is foreign, it's good. If there's an error and the number is US (for example, a clerical error) the query results are IMMEDIATELY destroyed, and this event is reported to subcommittees and FISA court. The metadata is collected, destroyed after 5 years, but cannot be queried except under the stringent circumstances. So it's basically if they could just go "back in time" on looking at certain phone numbers. and the 20 people is in the conference. Alexander said that 20 analysts and 2 managers (himself and Inglis) are the only people with access to this database.
- LoganCale 13y ago
  > they look at the number, if the number is foreign, it's good. If there's an error and the number is US (for example, a clerical error) the query results are IMMEDIATELY destroyed, and this event is reported to subcommittees and FISA court. They've also said they are not allowed to monitor U.S. citizens living abroad. What if they have a number outside the U.S. How do they detect that a number belongs to a U.S. citizen or resident? If a non-U.S. person has a phone number from the U.S. but they are not a citizen/resident and are not inside the U.S., is that protected or not? > The metadata is collected, destroyed after 5 years, but cannot be queried except under the stringent circumstances. That seems to contradict what they also said today, that no court order is required to query the database and it just requires reasonable suspicion on the part of the analyst. > Alexander said that 20 analysts and 2 managers (himself and Inglis) are the only people with access to this database. Is that technical access or legal access? In other words, are there technical limitations preventing anyone but those 22 people from accessing the data, or is everyone else just not supposed to? If they have sysadmins managing the databases, surely they have access too, as Snowden and Binney have both said?

marknutter 13y ago

The issue isn't the use of this content, it's the collection of the content. I don't think anyone would have an issue with the NSA collecting and storing data on specific targets after receiving a court order to do so. What people are taking issue with is the collection and storing of data on innocent civilians without a court order, to be used in the event they receive a court order. What makes this collection worse is that apparently low-level government contractors like Edward Snowden can access this vast pool of data, whether or not approved to do so. It's the equivalent of having the US Postal Service open and photocopy every single piece of mail that goes through their system to be stored in a database and used later by NSA/FBI/CIA analysts who have received the proper court order to do so.

rtpg 13y ago
Snowden can't access the data , according to this testimony. I don't have that much of a problem with this because the warrant is needed in order to actually do anything with the information. Also, to be precise, it's more as if the USPS scan the mail sender/receiver info (metadata after all). No content.
- LoganCale 13y ago
  They confirmed that a court order is not needed to query the database, only the reasonable suspicion of an analyst.
  - ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
    which Snowden says is also barely audited
- betterunix 13y ago
  "Snowden can't access the data , according to this testimony." How do they stop him? It sounds like "can't access the data" means "the rules say he cannot access it, and if he is caught he'll get in trouble." Given that the people we are talking about think in terms of "the least untruthful statement" they can make, I would demand as much detail as possible. "I don't have that much of a problem with this because the warrant is needed in order to actually do anything with the information." Today a warrant is needed. Tomorrow, maybe not. What if tomorrow, the law changes, and the government starts hunting down anyone with leftist leanings? The first thing they'll do is query the database. Laws are not sacred. Laws can be ignored or changed at any time. When we have to worry that the list of people we speak with today might be used against us tomorrow, there is a chilling effect on free speech. That is the danger of these databases. It is not enough that the data is held but can only be touched with a warrant; the data should not exist without a warrant.