NSA keeping track of every phone call Americans make

[Pontiuth Pilate]

"Yes, as long as Bush does it."

Not surprised.

 

[MobBoss]

Not surprised.

My, how faschist of you to quote me on something I never said. How very brown shirt of you.

If its wrong its not ok for anyone to do it...Bush, Kerry or whoever. Unless of course we are talking about driving under the influence and your name happens to be Kennedy.

However, we may disagree on what is or is not wrong....or even against the law. Thats why we have courts. If Bush does something so blatently against the law, impeach him and move on. Get the issue into court. But if you cant win, then move on and call it good.

 

[The Yankee]

How the heck do I know? I assume that such data mining gives them some sort of insight to terrorist phone patterns maybe?

It wasn't that long ago that we were told it was hard to track terrorists because they used one-use only cell phones. It seems we're still thinking the enemy is rather stationary even when the government keeps telling the public how often they like to move around.

So if it is utterly useless why all the hubbub? Answer: Just because it doesnt make any sense to your (or me for that matter) doesnt mean its not useful to them in some manner. If it is such a minor thing then whats the harm in it?

Minor things can cause harm as well. Perhaps you may trust this administration with the records...but would you trust the next? And if they did find something in those records, then how would they go about finding more? When do the laws that are in place play a role?

 

[cgannon64]

The purpose of such a huge datamining program is not to track the communications of terrorists.

Oh, it isn't?

A terrorist plot of 19 people is not going to cause the phone calls to Saudi Arabia to have a statistical blip. That's clearly bunk. To trace potential terrorist plots by mining the phone calls of 25 million Americans is the stupidest idea our intel agencies ever had, and these were the guys who decided that we could win the Cold War by making Fidel Castro's beard fall out or sending him exploding cigars.

It's only stupid if you misunderstand it. There isn't going to be a "statistical blip" - it's not like calls to Saudi Arabia have increased by 75% since September 11th. However, it does make a damn lot of sense to realize that, if you know someone to be a terrorist, the people they call are probably terrorists too

The purpose is on the contrary, very clearly to track the communications of people who:

1) are already within the country, and making calls here
2) already are being "traced"
3) are perceived by the executive as posing a threat but
4) cannot be legally arrested and thus taken care of less circuitously

in other words, protestors.

Hey, check that out! You've discovered exactly what they are doing; you've just replaced 'terrorist' with 'protestor'!

First off, there's a difference between the government doing something and a private company doing something. We hold the government to a more narrow standard on a lot of things, mostly because of the force that the government has available.

Yes: Now does this violate that standard? Where is the infringement on privacy, when the government is doing nothing more than examining records - not content - to see if you should be considered suspect?

Second, we're now talking about purely domestic surveillance here. Police don't tail everyone around checking to see if they go into red light districts. I'd sit a lot easier if the NSA was requiring the telcos to give them the call records only for numbers that were dialing Saudi Arabia weekly, rather than giving them everything so that they can comb through them on their own.

This sounds like knee-jerk paranoia. The government knows something! Therefore, the government will abuse it!

Then it was only calls by terrorists. Then we find out he's keeping records on 25 million Americans for no reason.

You do realize, don't you, that this is the only way a program like this can be successful? Before you can make a 'Suspected Terrorist' list, and an 'Ordinary American' list, you need to find out who calls who.

The more likely reality is that the NSA is engaged in roaming wiretaps on the calls of millions of ordinary Americans.

I have nothing to back that up.

I'd pull out a "faith-based" joke, but, well, those are a little played out, aren't they?

I think everyone who talks on the phone should say "Al quaeda" and "bomb" at least twice in every call. By saying something like "I think al quaeda is based in asia and wants to bomb Americans." we can give the NSA hundreds of millions of new leads to track down and justification for listening to everyday chatter among citizens and a reason to ask for even more money next year.

Should we really actively work to undermine a program that might, well, work?

It wasn't that long ago that we were told it was hard to track terrorists because they used one-use only cell phones. It seems we're still thinking the enemy is rather stationary even when the government keeps telling the public how often they like to move around.

Intelligence works; for some reason, though, it doesn't get listened to. If the government talks about how hard it is to realize who terrorists are, they're probably just covering their ass.

I just read today, for example, that the British spy service had all or almost all of the London bombers on a list of suspected terrorists... they just didn't around to tailing them.

 

[The Yankee]

Intelligence works; for some reason, though, it doesn't get listened to. If the government talks about how hard it is to realize who terrorists are, they're probably just covering their ass.

I just read today, for example, that the British spy service had all or almost all of the London bombers on a list of suspected terrorists... they just didn't around to tailing them.

And the calls we had on September 11th supposedly didn't get translated until days after. There's a shortage of actual humans doing the work. We can let a supercomputer do all the work it can, but it still won't tell us anything we'll need. And meanwhile, we'll have lots of other things sitting there that scream to be looked at, whether it's for a good purpose or not.

 

[cgannon64]

And the calls we had on September 11th supposedly didn't get translated until days after. There's a shortage of actual humans doing the work. We can let a supercomputer do all the work it can, but it still won't tell us anything we'll need. And meanwhile, we'll have lots of other things sitting there that scream to be looked at, whether it's for a good purpose or not.

Same exact problem in England. It takes 20-30 people to observe a terrorist round the clock; they had 800 suspected terrorists and around 2,000 agents.

That is why this program could be so important, if it works out. The problem is it could go both ways: A program that outlines terrorist networks might just throw thousands and thousands of names at the spy services, without enough people to learn about them; or, it might narrow the list down to a manageable size. It all depends on whether programs like this work, and whether they're done properly.

I think it goes without saying that something like this needs to be at least tried.

 

[The Yankee]

Same exact problem in England. It takes 20-30 people to observe a terrorist round the clock; they had 800 suspected terrorists and around 2,000 agents.

That is why this program could be so important, if it works out. The problem is it could go both ways: A program that outlines terrorist networks might just throw thousands and thousands of names at the spy services, without enough people to learn about them; or, it might narrow the list down to a manageable size. It all depends on whether programs like this work, and whether they're done properly.

I think it goes without saying that something like this needs to be at least tried.

It still seems like a contradiction to what they've been saying publicly when this war all started, that they're very mobile, that they have one-use phones and the like, satellite phones, etc.

There's been too much of the "just trust us" attitude going on for my liking.

I'll agree on the need for more human assets, reliable human assets anyway. Also, we're always short of people that can speak Arabic, Farsi, etc.

 

[Phlegmak]

My company sent all of us via email a "news" statement today. It's basically their response to the NSA issue. I don't know if I can post it here, if it's for internal (to AT&T) consumption only.

However, there's nothing new in it. Here's a paraphrase:
"We value our customers' privacy above all else."
"We simultaneously will cooperate with law enforcement and other government agencies for protecting the public welfare."
"We prize the trust our customers place in us. Beyond that, we don't comment on matters of national security."

 

[IglooDame]

My company sent all of us via email a "news" statement today. It's basically their response to the NSA issue. I don't know if I can post it here, if it's for internal (to AT&T) consumption only.

However, there's nothing new in it. Here's a paraphrase:
"We value our customers' privacy above all else."
"We simultaneously will cooperate with law enforcement and other government agencies for protecting the public welfare."
"We prize the trust our customers place in us. Beyond that, we don't comment on matters of national security."

Apparently Qwest values their customers' privacy above all else even more than AT&T does...

 

[MobBoss]

Apparently Qwest values their customers' privacy above all else even more than AT&T does...

No, they just require a court order is all.

 

[Kayak]

No, they just require a court order is all.

You mean a check or a balance? :Gasp: unpatriotic traitors!

 

[malclave]

You mean to tell me USA Today wrote about this issue not on Thursday, but really a few months back?

USA Today wrote about it Thursday. It was the NY Times that wrote about it a few months back. Hope that helps settle the confusion.

As far as people who can't imagine how this program might work, my own speculation (purely as a layman) is that it goes something like:

1. Database created/ updated (excluding the information from Qwest, probably the terrorists' long distance carrier of choice since the article)

2. Suspect phone number identified through other programs (such as the monitoring of international calls).

3. Database analyzed for the suspect number's activity, hoping to identify patterns identifying additional numbers that should be monitored.

4. Appropriate steps taken to monitor numbers identified in step 3.

Having the database already in place means that time is not wasted contacting each phone provider for records of each suspect phone number, meaning that there is a better chance to gather intelligence in a timely manner, hopefully preventing attacks instead of simply responding to them.


As far as the allegations against Hayden... personally, I think it unlikely that members of the Intelligence Committees (of either party) would refuse to meet with a legitimate whistleblower. However, if the Senate finds credible allegations that Hayden broke the law while in charge of another agency, it should certainly not confirm him, and the allegations should be investigated.

 

[IglooDame]

No, they just require a court order is all.

Right, that's essentially what I said.