New Snowden Doc Reveals How GCHQ/NSA Use The Internet To 'Manipulate, Deceive And Destroy Reputations'

from the and-not-just-terrorists dept

Tue, Feb 25th 2014 8:35am — Mike Masnick

A few weeks ago, Glenn Greenwald, while working with NBC News, revealed some details of a GCHQ presentation concerning how the surveillance organization had a "dirty tricks" group known as JTRIG -- the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group. Now, over at The Intercept, he's revealed the entire presentation and highlighted more details about how JTRIG would seek to infiltrate different groups online and destroy people's reputations -- going way, way, way beyond just targeting terrorist groups and threats to national security.

Among the core self-identified purposes of JTRIG are two tactics: (1) to inject all sorts of false material onto the internet in order to destroy the reputation of its targets; and (2) to use social sciences and other techniques to manipulate online discourse and activism to generate outcomes it considers desirable. To see how extremist these programs are, just consider the tactics they boast of using to achieve those ends: “false flag operations” (posting material to the internet and falsely attributing it to someone else), fake victim blog posts (pretending to be a victim of the individual whose reputation they want to destroy), and posting “negative information” on various forums.

For years, people have said that the purpose of groups like the NSA and GCHQ were merely "signals intelligence," which were about understanding and decoding signals, not about taking any sort of offensive standpoint. However, as the Snowden docs have repeatedly revealed, the mandate of these organizations has long been much more offensively based, and they seem to have little problem with using questionable tactics to destroy people's lives. As Greenwald notes, is this really a power you trust a totally secretive government agency with almost no real oversight to use without it being abused?

There's a lot more in Greenwald's writeup, which you should read, but just a few of the key slides are worth reading to get a sense of what's going on here. This isn't just about infiltrating terrorist organizations. They seem to be using these kinds of techniques on just about anyone they dislike, which harkens back to the Hoover-era FBI infiltrating and seeking to discredit anti-war groups. It also raises very serious questions about whether these efforts are being used to stifle political expression.

The full presentation is embedded below. The cover slide is really something...

The Art of Deception Training for a New (PDF)The Art of Deception Training for a New (Text)

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Filed Under: gchq, glenn greenwald, jtrig, nsa

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Ninja (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 6:48am

I'm not trying to dismiss these serious revelations but this is happening for a good while now. Made up charges have been thrown at TPB founders (more recently they tuned up the charges against Anakata to include obscure hacking charges), Kim Dotcom, Assange...

More recently on Saturday there was a major protest scheduled (via social networks) against the World Cup here in S�o Paulo. There was an intense smearing campaign against protesters trying to portrait them all as vandals and it has been revealed that the Govt is paying people to infiltrate and derail these protests into violence. The police also issued subpoenas against a whole load of people that confirmed they would be participating on Facebook EXACTLY at the time of the protests. The shit layer is thick, we haven't seen the worst of such intelligence services yet.
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- Ninja (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 6:51am
  
  Re:
  To clarify, these subpoenas (I'm not sure if you call them like that in English) required the people receiving them to go to a police office at the time of the protest which is being seen as an effort to thwart the protests that have pretty valid demands.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Jay (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 7:05am
    
    Re: Re:
    It's a sad state of affairs when we have our government turned against us in order to protect us...
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Michael, 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:51am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      What makes you think these tactics have anything to do with protecting US citizens?
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Jay (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:55am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        That's my point. Screw over the public to save them. It's a great system isn't it?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Alana (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 12:47pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        The problem there is the "To save them".
        
        Omit that from both posts.
        
        It's just screwing us. Period.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:39am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      It's a sad state of affairs when people turn to governments for protection. Government have only ever served to protect themselves. Time and again citizens get caught in the trap of believing that if we just find the right people these problems will just fix themselves and it never every works out well.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - John Fenderson (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 12:18pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        The alternative is mob rule, which I would argue is even worse.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:18pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Which is in essence the argument used by every tyrant, king or emperor; especially those who earned the epithet great; as they led people into wars so that they increase the people over who they ruled.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        John Fenderson (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:27pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        You'll get no argument from me on that.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:54pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        And look at how many people they got killed, and cities they laid waste to. While an anarchy might lead to boisterous discussion at times, I doubt that it would allow much violence.
        A side note, anybody trying to organize a violent anarchic period is doing so so they can become top tyrant when the existing power falls. They are not anarchists, as they wish to rule.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        John Fenderson (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 3:17pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        "I doubt that it would allow much violence."
        
        On this,we disagree.
        
        But it's all academic anyway -- no true anarchy can last if it consists of more than a handful or two of people (and probably not even then). Eventually a warlord or neighborhood bully will take the place over and then -- bam -- you have a government.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 2:00am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        I think modern communications can make the difference, as it allows people to self organize. It is easier to resist bullies when you can summon your neighbors. Things like occupy Sandy give me hope, as does the success in producing software of the open source software movement. Both are were/are anarchic approaches to solving problems that rely on people co-operating.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:11am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Lie's open software itself is tainted with it, you mean you never stopped to ask yourself, why Google Android uses persistant memory cache not allowing programs to exit, but remain in memory. When they first pushed there Model software to the Kernel developers it was rejected on the basis it could be misused to do bad things. (an Now???)
        
        Millions of distributions to choose from all of them with shody package updates that can leave you with a gapping security hole and now the people over at apple are suddenly realising that those SSL certificates dont really work the way they expect.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Pragmatic, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:19am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        But as John Fenderson correctly pointed out, these groups only really work when small. Bigger ones require a certain amount of organization to work effectively, and that mean administration => government. In the absence of a democratic, accountable system, you end up with tyranny. Government is made up of individuals who can be held to account, at least nominally. Tyrants just send their goons in if you offend them or they feel threatened by you.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        John Fenderson (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 7:27am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        "I think modern communications can make the difference, as it allows people to self organize. It is easier to resist bullies when you can summon your neighbors"
        
        And the minute that you have such a system going, you have a government, not anarchy.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 7:56am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Anarchy means no laws imposed by rulers using the threat of force, not no voluntary organization or agreed upon rules. In many ways an anarchy is an extreme democracy, and will settle on minimum rules, rather that the maximum rules of authoritarian government.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        John Fenderson (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 8:25am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Ahh, you're using that definition of anarchy. That clarifies things. Still, everything I said holds.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Jay (profile), 27 Feb 2014 @ 8:10am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        ... That's not actual anarchic practice and is a misrepresentation of actual libertarian socialist theories. While I don't practice anarchism, I would advise against this smear against people that are indeed anarchists.
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        Jay (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:07pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Mob rule works. It just works slowly. Too bad it hasn't been tried in the US...
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        Pragmatic, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:21am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Citation?
        
        As I stated earlier, in a small group it might work but en masse you end up with someone trying to organize the people => administration => government.
        
        And the best way to get people to organize is to present them with a common enemy. The person who emerges as a Great Protector then becomes a tyrant. See every revolution ever for details.
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        Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 6:51am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        When you analyze their role, administrative systems function as a means of passing requests from a person making the request to the person that can respond to the request, and are needed when communication capabilities are limited to one to one, letter, phone etc, and one to many, newspapers, radio and television. The Internet brings many to many communications systems to society, with many potential cross posts between different groups. This allows society to self organize on an ad-hoc basis to solve problems, eliminating the need for much of the existing administrative systems. Remove much of the fixed administrative system and the main lever used by tyrants to gain control over society is also removed. The Internet is providing the one thing required to enable a libertarian government to exist, unfettered many to many communications without having to use a representative to a talking shop, or gatekeeper to a broadcast medium.
        Interestingly, such ad-hoc systems often end up with more knowledge available to the system, as messages are seen by many watchers who can join the conversation if they have anything relevant to say.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Jay (profile), 27 Feb 2014 @ 3:55am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Citation?
        
        Well, look at the TwitchplaysPokemon on how people can eventually make decisions in a democratic manner. It works albeit slowly.
        
        Then you have other democratic decisions at the work place which makes for a way to organize outside of a bureacracy.
        
        You might want to look into flat structures and how they are different from the hierarchical structure that you're alluding to.
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      - any moose cow word, 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:26pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Government have only ever served to protect themselves and their financial backers.
        
        FTFY. The only time the government does much to serve the public is if an issue is pushed hard enough that it threatens their reelection. Otherwise, it's basically plutocratic bukkake.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 11:19am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      The State is an "expropriating property protector", which is a contradiction in terms. The State, at it's core, is organized force/aggression/violence.
      
      We don't need it. There are much more peaceful/consensual/effcient means of "governing" that respect self-ownership drived property rights and adhere to the non-aggression principle (the *initiation* of force is immoral, while self defense is valid).
      
      I prefer consensual relationships and exchange.
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      - Jay (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:09pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        That sounds rather utopian and ignores that when the state is eliminated in a society without getting rid of societal differences, it leads to class warfare, where someone gets exploited for the sake of a select few...
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        Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 6:22pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        You keep saying, �you're never gonna make it.�
        
        I don't believe you or John F. Both of you seem to be stuck in a paradigm that requires the illusion of government. It requires an evolution of thought that probably does not benefit either of your situations. You both benefit greatly by the unjust governments that people believe in and give power to. You are consumers of a vast amount of resources that are provided to you at a fraction of their real costs. Meanwhile, majority of the human beings in this world receive the butt end of what it takes to support your life style. It is true; your life style would not exist without an organized, aggressive and violent government. I think in the longer term. My life means nothing except for how I prepare this world for the future. Governments are the biggest polluters and kill the most life on this planet. Eliminating them would be a huge benefit for the future of this planet.
        
        �someone gets exploited for the sake of a select few...�
        
        You are currently part of the select few that are exploiting the world with your �government.� Your intellectual class is robbing majority of the world of its basic human rights.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Jay (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:37pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        You keep saying, �you're never gonna make it.�
        
        Funny, my post never said that. Where are you parsing that from?
        
        Both of you seem to be stuck in a paradigm that requires the illusion of government.
        
        Or maybe the illusion is that private markets lead to disparities in society if you don't address the issues at their core.
        
        You both benefit greatly by the unjust governments that people believe in and give power to.
        
        Or maybe blaming government for the ills of society isn't quite the best way to understand how to move forward.
        
        You are consumers of a vast amount of resources that are provided to you at a fraction of their real costs.
        
        That's funny, because I don't see myself as just a consumer. And that reductionist POV is one of a few different ways to look at the world.
        
        It is true; your life style would not exist without an organized, aggressive and violent government.
        
        That's a HUGE stretch...
        
        Governments are the biggest polluters and kill the most life on this planet.
        
        Actually, "private markets" are.
        
        Eliminating them would be a huge benefit for the future of this planet.
        
        Right, let's just ignore that concept called democracy to just say that we don't need government...
        
        You are currently part of the select few that are exploiting the world with your �government.�
        
        Nice passive aggressiveness, but you've yet to make a logical argument that actually substantiates your point. Try harder instead of trying to blame people.
        
        Your intellectual class is robbing majority of the world of its basic human rights.
        
        That... That just doesn't even make any sense...
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 10:06am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        "Actually, "private markets" are."
        
        Wrong.
        
        "Given the scale of the military-industrial complex (some call it an empire), the U.S. military is the largest single polluter on the planet."
        
        "By the late 1980s, public data revealed that the Pentagon was generating a ton of toxic waste per minute, more toxic waste than the five largest U.S. chemical companies together, making it the largest polluter in the United States."
        
        "According to the 2008-2009 President�s Cancer Panel Report, nearly 900 of EPA�s approximately 1,300 Superfund sites are abandoned military bases/facilities or manufacturing and testing sites..."
        
        "Author Barry Sanders estimates the U.S. military�s �armored vehicles, planes and luxury planes consume one-quarter of the world�s jet fuel and close to two million reported gallons of oil every day"
        
        Here is the link: http://www.psr.org/environment-and-health/environmental-health-policy-institute/responses/the-milita ry-enterprise-as-global-polluter.html
        
        And on killing. I don't think the private markets kill like the government does. I will let you prove that one to me since I just disproved your claim regarding pollution.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Jay (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 4:02pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Wrong.
        
        Gee... Having corporations run everything in a perverse sense that makes Adam Smith turn over in his grave isn't hurting the public domain at all.
        
        Right...
        
        I will let you prove that one to me since I just disproved your claim regarding pollution.
        
        You haven't disproved anything. You've just thrown out some data while ignoring such issues as the West Virginia fracking spill or the West Texas explosion continue to occur.
        
        How about the NAFTA agreement between corporations and the state to move to other areas to pollute?
        
        Maybe instead of a heavy focus on blaming government, you could learn that corporate wrong doing has systemically destroyed the environment as well as lives, all for the pursuit of profit.
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        Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 9:44pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Government allows and often provides protection for these corporations to exist.
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        Jay (profile), 27 Feb 2014 @ 3:56am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        That says nothing about eliminating the actual problems of a society which still gives more money to those running a corporation than those that work in it.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        John Fenderson (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 7:33am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        You seem to misunderstand my position. I'm not saying that government is desirable or undesirable. I'm saying that it's inevitable. History and human nature demonstrate this quite clearly.
        
        My position is that since it's inevitable, the wisest thing to do is to make it as beneficial and harmless as possible.
        
        If you have a workable alternative to government, I'm very, very open to it.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Pragmatic, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:22am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Yep.
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    - Robert, 31 Jan 2015 @ 4:36pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      It is not government. It is individuals within government agencies seeking to subvert those agencies to push their own politics.
      The individuals who wrote up those policies and who pushed those policies should be investigated and prosecuted because they illegal used government resources for electoral purposes seeking to publicly persecute individuals who challenged their politics.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:52am
    
    Re: Re:
    Sounds like they should move the protest location to the police station(s)
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- Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:42am
  
  Re:
  I believe you are correct in that we haven't seen the worst yet.
  
  I recall during the time of the OWS protestors, they had a camera monitor/internet setup manned by both bank personal and city cops.
  
  There was a persistent problem reported by those protestors about infiltrators hunting information. It was said most of them were pretty easy to spot because they kept wanting to know the names of the leaders.
  
  Later it was revealed that the FBI was coordinating responses across the nation with local police departments and that because the protestors had been labeled terrorists that the National Fusion Centers were dead in the middle of gathering info.
  
  There were also reports of anarchists in the middle of the protests breaking windows and doing malicious random damage which gave the cops a reason to act against a peaceful crowd. Many were the speculations that those anarchists were supplied by the authorities as they were not wanted by the protestors who continually pleaded for them to stop.
  
  Of course this event would not be complete without mentioning that the FBI had drawn up backup plans of using silenced sniper weapons to take out the leaders of the OWS movement in Houston.
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  - Ninja (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:05am
    
    Re: Re:
    At one of the protests there were a few who tried to break a public building (I can't recall if it was the Town Hall or the Municipal Theater) and the protesters that were just walking in peace made some sort of human barrier to stop them. There are also several cases where protesters grouped around wounded cops and helped carry them to safety when things went berserk (at the time the police was totally at fault for the escalation). At a point tear gas bombs were shot INSIDE hospitals where the protesters, wounded and healthy, tried to seek shelter.
    
    At the moment they are very worried with the World Cup. There are two very dangerous laws that gained a lot of traction with the last demonstration, one is the Marco Civil (to some extent the Brazilian version of the terrifying spawn of SOPA and the Cybersecurity bills) and an anti-terrorism law that combined would be the wet dream of any dictatorship. Obviously they are ignoring the main source of such disruptions: the fact that we spend billions of dollars in a circus while our health system is in shambles, the education produces functional illiterates and our judicial/jail/law enforcement systems are broken resulting in very poor conditions for those who can't afford the private option of what the Government should provide as is written in the Constitution (our Constitution).
    
    While terrible, what's happening here is hardly a surprise given our recent history for those who are following it.
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    - Arginine, 25 Feb 2014 @ 7:15pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Olympics, host nation major sporting events, are surpassing wars as the owners preferred method of stealing the publics money.
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- M House, 25 Feb 2014 @ 5:44pm
  
  Re:
  People don't seem to understand that when these type of things are revealed people aren't shocked that they've been happening. They're shocked that there is PROOF that it is happening.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- onetimename, 14 May 2014 @ 12:16am
  
  Re:
  once and for all, assange/wikileaks is a honey-pot, never-ever-ever mention that guy/organisation in this light
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- Blogger, 8 Jun 2014 @ 8:08am
  
  Re:
  Hi,
  
  this is clearly the same thing which is going on here in Germany as well. It is not about the soccer thing but about the Ucrainian/US/EU/Russia-crisis. We have now round-about 30 cities in Germany in which we have Anti-War-Demos on every monday. What mass-media is doing is clearly as if they were instructed by CIA/BND/GCHQ or some other western governmental organisation: if they report about these demos at all, then only to tell stupidized listeners that all these people on the streets are right-winged people belonging to some Nazi-organisation. It really is a shame. We are now hundreds of thousends marching every monday and still they call us Nazis - although we are only marching because no one of use want to have a next war in the heart of Europe.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Violynne (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 7:24am

"...which harkens back to the Hoover-era FBI infiltrating and seeking to discredit..."
Back to? This assumes the FBI stopped the activity, which is a foolish belief.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely. The only history lesson that remains factual over time.
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- Stephen Shellen, 22 Jul 2014 @ 8:13pm
  
  Re:
  As someone that has had targeting since 1995 I can tell you this is a very serious problem and it destroys lives, families and careers.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:42am

I'm sure GCHQ and NSA blacklist a person's background check information too, so they can't get a job.

"Stop deals / ruin business relationships"

Yup, sure sounds like it to me. I knew it!
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Michael, 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:54am

This completely explains where Alan Cooper's signature came from.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:55am

wtf is up with all the pictures of ufo's, and muslim people in the presentation?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Kal Zekdor (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 2:44am
  
  Re:
  Easy, they're protecting us from aliens.
  
  (Sad thing is that might be the actual subtext they were going for.)
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:58am

> For years, people have said that the purpose of groups like the NSA and GCHQ were merely "signals intelligence," which were about understanding and decoding signals, not about taking any sort of offensive standpoint

If that were true before (I'm sure it wasn't), there should've been no doubt they would be doing offensive stuff once they created the "US Cyber Command" and then merged it with NSA...why do you think?!

The fact that Obama rejected the NSA review panel's suggestion to separate the two as soon as it came out and before his official speech, should tell you everything you need to know about his stance on this, and that he WANTS to do offensive stuff with the NSA.
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Lorpius Prime (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:00am

Augh. GCHQ needs to be shut down just for its terrible Powerpoint slides.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:02am

If you were on any forums that discuss politics, then im sure you alredy knew about the paid shills.
Israel is doing it too btw, but at least they openly admit it.
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zip, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:05am

This reads like a modernized version of COINTELPRO alright. It would seem (at least on the surface) that dissident groups have always had a strong tendency to break up amid infighting. Of course, documents such as this suggest it's often no accident.
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- weneedhelp (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:33am
  
  Re:
  Cointelpro... alive and well.
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YonLbe_DiFI
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_ex1aXWois
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Tom, 2 Mar 2014 @ 10:51am
  
  Re:
  Absolutely right. Every group that presents a potential threat has been infiltrated. One trick is the insertion of agents provocateurs, together with agents in place. The former are used to discredit the organisation, the latter climb the ladders of power by unmasking the agents provocateurs.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
edpo, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:10am

"Stop deals / ruin business relationships"
As someone who has spent a few decades working at the same sort of law firm recently revealed to have been under surveillance by the Australian Signals Directorate (and which offered to share its materials with the NSA), I find it incredibly offensive that our own governments are in the business of attacking the character and commercial prospects of ordinary citizens who have done nothing wrong other than fulfill their legal duty to their clients.
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Anonymous Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:22am

Break up the NSA
As Bruce Schneier suggested this morning, breaking up the NSA could be a good thing. Check out his methodology.

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/02/breaking_up_the.html
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:23am

what is so frightening is that if the head of the Nation knows about what's going on, he must either be condoning it or be too afraid of whoever is in charge of the particular security agencies in question to do anything to reign it in!
this surely makes every single thing that the government does brought into disbelief and removes any faith in whatever is done or said by the no1 person!
something else that i find a real piss take on the people is that no telecom company can tell you where tele sales calls, nuisance calls or any other 'out of the ordinary' calls come from. how can that be true when they allow NSA or whoever to have access to all calls and they can tell you whether you made a particular, at a particular time, to a particular number, what the call was about and whether you were having a crap at the time or not!!
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:23am

Someone's been cribbing from Scientology and Anonymous' playbooks. I'm glad that the NSA/GCHQ have such principled inspirations.
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- John Fenderson (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:22am
  
  Re:
  Where do you think Scientology picked the technique up?
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  - zip, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:16pm
    
    Re: Re: (Scientology)
    It's often been said that the Scientology cult runs a more effective intelligence operation than most countries in the world. L.Ron Hubbard claimed to have worked in military intelligence (all we know is that he was in the US Navy) before he bestowed upon the "Church" of Scientology a KGB-like agency, now known as the "Office of Special Affairs" whose purpose was to "destroy" the cult's enemies (i.e., critics) by any means possible, legal or not.
    
    Too bad a few agents got caught infiltrating the Federal government (the biggest security breach in US history) and went to jail in the 1970s. It's a wonder why the government didn't just shut down and dismantle the entire cult operations right then and there.
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    - stimoceiver (profile), 2 Mar 2014 @ 11:52am
      
      Re: Re: Re: (Scientology)
      Too bad a few agents got caught infiltrating the Federal government (the biggest security breach in US history) and went to jail in the 1970s. It's a wonder why the government didn't just shut down and dismantle the entire cult operations right then and there.
      
      Actually, it wasnt very long after the failed "Operation Snow White" that Hubbard went into hiding. After he was out of the game a new shell corporation sprung up with a new board of directors which then took ownership of all the old copyrights owned by Hubbard.
      
      And shortly after that the IRS suddenly recanted their years of persecution of Scientology and decided to grant the tax exempt status they had been seeking for decades.
      
      So its quite possible that some of those in the government who originally wanted to dismantle Scientology had a change of heart and decided it served a better purpose to keep it going, only under entirely new management.
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      - simality (profile), 9 Jun 2014 @ 2:57am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: (Scientology)
        IIRC, tax exemption status was granted after quite a few Scientologists filed lawsuits against the IRS. The courts and government gave them tax-exemption just to shut them up.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:33am

Point out to government that these actions mean that the spy agencies are meddling in politics. While this may suite them when the attack is against politics that they do not like, it also means that they could become targets when the spy agencies dislike their politics. The spy agencies almost certainly have the capability of affecting the outcome of a close election race, and hence which party get into power.
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- weneedhelp (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:49am
  
  Re:
  Which party? Republicrats? Demolicans? Kang or Kodos?
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:45am

Sounds quite a bit like a corporate trolling , I wonder how many internet security firms have been slandered due to the cozy nature of the nsa and chertoff group and many other nsa contractors.
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Alan Kurtz (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 9:55am

Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
This story's headline reveals how Techdirt uses the Internet to manipulate, deceive and destroy reputations. The "New Snowden Doc" in question reveals nothing about how the NSA uses the Internet. Rather, it's entirely about UK counterpart GCHQ. But that doesn't deter Techdirt from adding "NSA" to its headline for the purpose of discrediting the U.S. government. This is analytical insight into the news? Seems to me more like tabloid-style sensationalism.
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- Mike Masnick (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:10pm
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  This story's headline reveals how Techdirt uses the Internet to manipulate, deceive and destroy reputations. The "New Snowden Doc" in question reveals nothing about how the NSA uses the Internet. Rather, it's entirely about UK counterpart GCHQ. But that doesn't deter Techdirt from adding "NSA" to its headline for the purpose of discrediting the U.S. government.
  
  No, as Greenwald's story explains, the presentations are by the GCHQ but *were presented to the NSA*. Hence my inclusion of it in the title.
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  - zip, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:41pm
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    It would appear that even Greenwald greatly underestimated the close alliance between the US and UK, as well as the voraciousness in which the UK government would go after America's perceived enemies.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:59pm
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    being presented with something, is not the same as doing it yourself, so any link, weak as it is, is good enough for you?
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  - Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 3:30pm
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    Drop the reference to the Brit agency and leave just NSA in the title. Seems to me it can be read as an unequivocal statement that the NSA uses the internet to...
    
    Now, before having a cow take note I do not dismiss at all the possibility that some US agencies may engage in such activities. Which ones though can only be speculated, and not identified with authority without more information.
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  - Alan Kurtz (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 5:18pm
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    Mike Masnick, you are mistaken. Glenn Greenwald explained that the "four classified GCHQ documents presented to the NSA" formed the basis of articles recently published by NBC News. This new JTRIG document appeared at the Intercept, where Greenwald never claimed that "The Art of Deception: Training for Online Covert Operations" had been presented to or shared with the NSA. Indeed, Mr. Greenwald was very careful to not say that. I reiterate: your headline is manipulative and deceitful.
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    - techflaws (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:32pm
      
      Re: Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
      THAT's the point you choose to criticise? Everything else seems to alright then. Please do tell, are you ACTUALLY naive enought to believe the NSA hasn't resorted to similar tactics?
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    - Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 6:27am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
      Oh, I'm sorry. Let's give you the benefit of the doubt and say the NSA hasn't tried any of this.
      
      At best this makes you and the NSA look slightly less douchebaggy.
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- Ruben, 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:30pm
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  Here's somebody who clearly hasn't been paying very much attention to the details of this story.
  
  I'd suggest that you take the time to understand what "REL TO USA" and "FVEY" mean.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 5:32am
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    OHAI GCHQ Shill.
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  - Alan Kurtz (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 8:46am
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    Ruben, I take it that "REL TO USA" and "FVEY" mean that the NSA shared this JTRIG training guide with the other members of the Five Eyes. However, my objection is to Techdirt's manipulative and deceitful headline, which proclaims: "New Snowden Doc Reveals How GCHQ/NSA Use The Internet To 'Manipulate, Deceive And Destroy Reputations.'" The document in question�"The Art of Deception: Training for Online Covert Operations"�reveals no such thing. There's no evidence from Glenn Greenwald or anyone else that the NSA ever attempted to implement the ideas in GCHQ's guide. Honestly, isn't there enough hysteria surrounding the tens of thousands of NSA files that Snowden stole and passed to Greenwald et al.? Mike Masnick's compulsion to singlehandedly pour fuel on the flames is reprehensible.
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    - Ruben, 26 Feb 2014 @ 12:43pm
      
      Re: Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
      I'd argue that this is precisely what the leaked document outlines. Of course nobody has proven that this actually happened, but then again, nobody's found, or has disclosed that they've found exploits outlined in the NSA's TAO catalog. Does that mean they're not being used, or they don't exist? Of course not.
      
      I absolutely they GCHQ and NSA are employing the tactics outlined in this document. If they got caught, it would be because they were doing such a bad job that the things they were doing had been traced back to them. I doubt they would be so careless.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2014 @ 12:10am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
      "Honestly, isn't there enough hysteria surrounding the tens of thousands of NSA files...?"
      
      In a word: No.
      
      Further, what has been and continues to be revealed is reprehensible. Discussion of those reprehensible revelations is not.
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- Eponymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 3:02pm
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  You seem to miss the reality that the NSA has GCHQ spy on Americans as a work around to the constitutional forbiddance of US agencies from doing this. All of 5-Eyes work in tandem with each other; so to assume that the NSA isn't up to this abroad, or that this isn't being done here in the states is highly naive at best (with being a shill for this very thing at worst).
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- Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 3:20pm
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  Follow along. It has already been reported that they team up. Whatever it is illegal for the NSA to do on american soil is contracted out to GCHQ and vice versa. Keep up, will ya.
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- GM, 25 Feb 2014 @ 4:29pm
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  What the Snowden docs have also revealed in NSA's own words is that NSA routinely uses GCHQ as a proxy, in fact pays them large sums of money, to aid NSA in circumventing US law and the Constitution. I'll leave it you to connect today's rather obvious dots.
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- Commander Jameson, 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:22pm
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  Nice troll!
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  - john senchak (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 8:41pm
    
    Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
    So you real think that we as Americans have full fourth amendment rights, after the Snowden leaks. With all these revelations about the NSA and the GCHQ it appears to me that we are slowly living a police state where your rights don't mean what the founders intended when the Constitution was created
    
    You can call me what you want, but it's my opinion, not some type of bait to create a negative argument which will not support a true debate about where the United States is heading when it comes to internet and phone privacy.
    
    Thank you for taking the time to read this
    (Libertarian)
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    - Collin Merenoff, 26 Dec 2015 @ 3:39am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
      There was no internet when the Constitution was created. If you want to debate how governments use the internet, fine. But don't pretend it's about the fourth amendment, when we have a real fourth amendment problem with cops killing innocent people in cold blood because of not liking what they look like.
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- Anonymous Coward, 28 Feb 2014 @ 5:40am
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  The 5 eyes share everything sillypants. They just use the English to get around domestic spying.
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- Anonymous Coward, 9 Mar 2014 @ 12:19am
  
  Re: Manipulative & Deceitful Headline
  If Edward Snowden obtained the documents, then it is almost certain that they had been shared with NSA, he was an administrator for NSA's systems after all, not GCHQ's systems.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:00am

So this is why we can't have nice things.

Thanks, NSA.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:06am

Doubt it stops at personal attacks
Just think about the power the Government has to sway opinion on anything and everything. Think climate change for example. ;)

But seriously, anything they want to use to control individuals, groups or even the US population as a whole is obviously not morally out of bounds for those guys.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:07am

To anyone who is somehow still in doubt, News Media is listed under their diagram of tools they use to do this.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:41am

omg.� let's see if i have this right.

so these clowns likely show up on comment sections on sites like this one.� i'll have to keep that in mind.

i recall reading how the japanese power companies had their employees participate as general public in support of whatever crap ideas the companies wanted to foist on the public.� unfortunately for the power companies, the word got out on that and the people there are extremely reluctant to be influenced that way now.� i guess we are well down that path, huh?
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- John Fenderson (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 12:19pm
  
  Re:
  The odds are pretty good that these clowns have already been here, and still are.
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  - Anonymous Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:03pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Oh, oh. McCarthy's 'Red Scare'. Who's with the NSA? If you say you aren't...
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    - zip, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:49pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      The internet propaganda & disinformation blitz is much greater than just official government agency employees. There are also many civilian sympathizers that are recruited and deployed as a "force multiplier."
      
      http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Israels-newest-PR-weapon-The-Internet-Megaphone
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    - John Fenderson (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:53pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Nice try, but not hardly.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:51am

The more people who know of these tactics, the less effective they will be, and the greater the credibility gap becomes for any government agency. It's funny, you have Nixon pretty much saying this same thing back in 71 (could have been 72) when he said that the courts didn't really matter, Ellsberg has to be tried in the court of public opinion. Then he sent people to investigate and break the law to try to get some dirt on Ellsberg (hence the secret operations group known as the "plumbers" were created).

Scientology's L Ron Hubbard created a policy titled "Fair Game" based on similar tactics used by the CIA. This was a policy that involved destroying the credibility any person deemed a threat, would possess. This involved the tactic of always attacking, so the other person is forced to be defensive. This also uses the tactic where if a person hears the same thing, but from multiple sources, they are more likely to believe it, which plays into the herd mentality.

The tactics that used to work so well for scientology no long work, and that's because people are aware of them, and the credibility gap has become too large. Like scientology, the credibility gap for these agencies keeps on getting larger.
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Crusty the Ex-Clown, 25 Feb 2014 @ 10:54am

Could we have a show of hands?
OK, now everyone here who is shilling for No Such Agency please raise your hand.
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vastrightwing, 25 Feb 2014 @ 11:56am

Deep politics
This falls in the deep politics subject. Just do a search on this subject and you will find it relates to this topic quite well.

Essentially, open politics that we all see around us is the veneer. The real power is below the surface shrouded in secrecy. The tactic of discrediting is planting lies and disinformation. You can spot this happening when an "event" occurs and the reaction is a fast narrative and early facts long before there should be any. The guilty party has been identified; the narrative has been disseminated to the media. They all are saying the exact same thing in unison. There will be no investigation and when there is an investigation, it will be performed by the wrong participants.

Does this sound vaguely familiar?
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- Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 3:29pm
  
  Re: Deep politics
  Like the chemical weapons in syria?
  Or 911?
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 12:38pm

This article is continually getting taken down in reddit.
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quawonk, 25 Feb 2014 @ 12:59pm

This might explain ootb.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:38pm

These peoples names dont deserve to be protected
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Eponymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:42pm

This is hilarious...
I fail to see how they think this will achieve the results they want, have these people never really engaged with others online before (outside of trying to "manage" them for some other ends)? People's cynicism and lack of trust on the internet is already crazy high, and all this will achieve is a minor raise to it. Sure, in the short term you may disrupt the message and sway of a target by getting people to further question the legitamacy of that target, but in the long term you are traing the populace to view any and all info with a jaundiced eye! They are, in effect, just further erroding their own authority for more people will become more "tribal", trusting in their own limited, select group, in reaction to more of these efforts. Approaches like this inevitably sow the ground for further skeptics and dissidents to bloom forth just as counter-terrorism efforts are used by terrorists to drum up support (but already-cynics like me see that the silverlining of this for these agencies is job security for them at the perile of the populace's security).
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- any moose cow word, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:20pm
  
  Re: This is hilarious...
  They are, in effect, just further erroding their own authority for more people will become more "tribal", trusting in their own limited, select group, in reaction to more of these efforts.
  
  Maybe this is in fact what they want, as such groups are more easily manipulated--ie "conservative" media. It doesn't matter if the group is small, as long as they can reliably be cajoled to vote the way you want.
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  - Eponymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:53pm
    
    Re: Re: This is hilarious...
    When I think of "tribal" conservatives what comes to my mind is militiamen and the sovereign movement, groups that I don't think are easily manipulated by outside forces. I also highly doubt very many of them participate in national voting (but I have no data to base that on, it's just a hunch), so I think there is a point where groups become so niche it would be counterproductive to any scheme to control them. IMO a few large monocultures would be the ideal grouping to keep the populace in compliance.
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    - Pragmatic, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:32am
      
      Re: Re: Re: This is hilarious...
      @ Eponymous Coward, it's easier to manipulate the militiamen and the sovereign movement by playing to their prejudices. Make them more paranoid, more suspicious, and more resentful of perceived interference. Then make them suspicious of each other by pointing out "impurities" in their ideology. As extremists get more entrenched, they begin to alienate those members who consider themselves to be moderate until schisms develop and the group splinters. We see this all the time in statements like, "You must be a liberal socialist!", etc.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 1:49pm

At what point do people start to stand up?

When they start to tell your boss lies, when they start to affect your ability to put bread on the table? at what point huh?at what point?
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- foodandart (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 5:26pm
  
  Re:
  When Oprah or whomever is on the mid-morning talk-shows tells America's soccer moms to, that is when.
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any moose cow word, 25 Feb 2014 @ 2:07pm

If the news media took time for fact checking (aka journalism), this wouldn't happen. However, with the near complete corporate takeover, they now largely treat proper research as a cost--like all cost, it has to be cut. This allows them to be manipulated by anyone who has the power and will to do so.

This dovetails with the fact that "national security" has increasingly been conflated with "economic interest". This in turn has also shifted from the economic interest of the people to the economic interest of the largest corporations. What then follows is that a corporation that wants to snub a group or individual simply has the "intelligence" agencies "leak" false information to the media, which then parrots it with hardly a modicum of scrutiny.

It's the perfect storm of public manipulation.
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DOlz (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 3:07pm

I had trouble believing they were that stupid
What did Prenda do te tick these people off?
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Terry A. Davis, 25 Feb 2014 @ 4:17pm

God
They worry about public opinion and not at all about God.
I worry about God's opinion and not at all public.
God has awakened and He says He wants His respect restored to what it was. God will play a public role. You done backed the wrong horse, CIA. Yer fucked. You better scramble to meet the new reality.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 4:40pm

So this is what horse with no name defends with a rigorous fervour.

Just Sayin' just hates it when due process is enforced.
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capt, 25 Feb 2014 @ 4:50pm

perversions and manufactured statistics
The American law enforcement perversions and manufactured statistics Alliances are a stain on American law enforcement.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 6:31pm

"It also raises very serious questions about whether these efforts are being used to stifle political expression."

Lol, no it doesn't. It confirms plain as fucking day that they do so. Further they aren't the only ones. Tumblr SJWs, JIDF (yes, it actually is real), and the nutbags in 4chan's /pol/ all love pulling the same shit. You can often detect it in action by watching for derailing comments, strawmen arguments, supposed supporters making terrible arguments, and even just people chiming in "me too" in order to make a certain opinion seem more popular than another.

The fact that our government decided to get in on the fun should surprise absolutely no-one given that governments are the most notorious purveyors of propaganda in history.
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- GEMont (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:38am
  
  Re:
  You're assuming that these organizations and groups are not actually created by the NSA in the first place.
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Noise Filter, 25 Feb 2014 @ 7:04pm

batman reference on cover?
look at the cover of the full PPT presentation.
Reference to the Aurora / Joker Shooting?
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Feb 2014 @ 7:20pm

Certainly says something about our species, thx i really needed to be more depressed
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john senchak (profile), 25 Feb 2014 @ 7:23pm

dismantle the NSA
Their is no more fourth a amendment
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Tim Jones, 25 Feb 2014 @ 11:11pm

Document looks fake to me.
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conrad-brean (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 2:19am

bravo
Kudos Tech-dirt! Wonderful revelations. GCHQ must be completely going bananas over this disclosure. What I find exceptionally interesting is how the people behind these schemes actually legitimate these actions. Most normal people would need to take a bath every 5 minutes to try to cleanse themselves of such undignified behavior. And to think that they consider themselves the 'good guys'. What a joke.
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brad, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:18am

teller
It's disgusting to me that they used a picture of Teller and a quote of his at the end of their presentation, considering him and Penn are pretty staunchly libertarian. Ever seen "Bullshit!"? This type of revelation would be the last thing they would ever want their image associated with.
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:22am

The problem with open software is that it is open and other people can just join as a developer and push updates to there software model complete with security bugs.

All this Pwning and Owning all started with open source...

The cure is pretty simple, delete every single offensive piece of software used to cause harm to other systems and you successfully cripple the next penis that comes along wanting to do it!
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GEMont (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:35am

Blackmail/extortion, theft, character assassination....
So far it appears that the only actual anti-terrorist activities of the NSA is to track the cell phones of known members of foreign anti-american organizations so that Obama can have his crack joy-stick pilots fly drones into whatever building the cell phone happens to reside, in the hopes that their target will be among the corpses of those killed in the building - basically anti-terrorist terrorism.

All the rest of their time and effort and expense (paid for by American tax payers) is concerned with spying on, extorting and destroying the reputations and lives of Americans they don't like and foreign allies, stealing corporate secrets, and running errands for the entertainment industry.

One has to ask the question: who does the NSA really work for?

It is obviously not working for Americans, since the "adversary" it is attacking most often happens to be American citizens.
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- Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:47am
  
  Re: Blackmail/extortion, theft, character assassination....
  @GEmont well your saw the UFO in the slides, its obvious who they're working for... All your internet belong to us!
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  - Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 3:56am
    
    Re: Re: Blackmail/extortion, theft, character assassination....
    People said the NSA was just a conspiracy theory... whoops no it's not, then they said "FEMA" concentration camps where also a conspiracy theory.. http://www.altnews.info/192/fema-concentration-camps/
    
    I suppose rex48 and adex under the hoover and nixon administration where just conspiracy theory's too!
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 4:43am

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chqi8m4CEEY
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fred, 26 Feb 2014 @ 4:54am

Griftwald is a troll
Guess saying Griftwald automatically makes me a secret agent NSA operative.

Why believe...well facts...when you have some guy blogging from his gated Brazilian community.
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 5:01am

The definition of "Terrorist" is very wide indeed at the national security establishments.
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 5:06am

The only conspiracy every government is involved directly in.. is always "the Conspiracy of Silence!"
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 5:10am

GCHQ are fucking scum.

Enough said.
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Dana Bostick (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 7:27am

Using internet to discredit
This is sounding/looking a lot like the tactics of the Church of Scientology. OMG, have they infiltrated the NSA too like they did the IRS?
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Feb 2014 @ 11:35am

New Policy = Blame GCHQ
So, whenever something happens, blame GCHQ.

Internet down? It's GCHQ.
Can't find your keys? It's GCHQ.
Milk spoiled? It's GCHQ.
Wife has a headache and isn't in the mood for sex? It's GCHQ.
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aidsfrolf shitler, 26 Feb 2014 @ 11:43am

nsa did weev
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GEMont (profile), 26 Feb 2014 @ 2:12pm

Department of Home Surveillance and Dirty Tricks
The proof that the NSA is now composed of petty corporate college graduate types with dreams of being 007s, is that if they had done what any well trained secret spy agency would have done at the onset in a situation like this - deny that any of Snowden's documents were real, and claim that Snowden had been reprimanded while on the job numerous times for trying to create a parody web-site of the NSA using Power Point presentation graphics - there would be no controversy and Snowden would have found no audience, beyond the very edges of the fringe population who already suspected the NSA was a corporate terrorist group.

Instead, they proved immediately to the whole world, that all the documents confiscated by Snowden and released by the Guardian were 100% real and that the NSA was a criminal gang of incompetent juvenile assholes, by going after Snowden as if he was a mass murderer of babies.

This is what happens when fascist corporations teach graduate business students how to run a secret dirty tricks operation.
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Cato, 1 Mar 2014 @ 9:01am

What's a good place to declare political asylum?
Given the kinds of hatemongery I've seen thrown at the Tea Party over the past few years all over the internet, most of it having little connection with the actual reality of the group, I really have to wonder... Would the Obama Administration have used the NSA to target his loudest detractors for harassment and ruin their reputations? I can't say with any sort of credibility that they wouldn't, given that they have already abused their power to use the IRS in such a way.

T
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GEMont (profile), 1 Mar 2014 @ 5:57pm

The T(oilet) Party
Silly rabbit.

Obama is a republican ringer.

One need only view his admin's accomplishments to realize that the vast majority of its successes have been Republican wet dreams since Bush the first.

Had they (s)elected another Republican to office after Bush the Second, even the thinking-challenged members of the US public would have realized the voting system was fixed.

A black republican running as a democrat was the ticket.
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Cato, 2 Mar 2014 @ 3:20am

@GEMont / Post 125
You're living in denial, there's nothing appealing to the Republican base about any of Obama's actions in office, since most of us support a smaller government and not the monstrous Leviathan that Obama's administration has only grown.

Obama is your nightmare, and if he seems to uncomfortably resemble Bush, it's not because Obama is a Republican. It's because the Republican Party's leadership ditched its ideals after Reagan and took a Big Government Nixonian turn, which left it largely indistinguishable from the modern Democratic Party's offerings. It took Bush the 2nd to make us realize how deep the rot went and we've been trying to fix it ever since.

I suggest either cleaning house in your own party so you don't have another one (hey, that's what we're doing in ours), or seriously considering switching parties.
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- GEMont (profile), 2 Mar 2014 @ 12:56pm
  
  Re: @GEMont / Post 125
  Now that was some of the best history rewriting I've come across on this or any other blog and deserves a class A rant.
  
  "since most of us support a smaller government"
  
  That its 100% bullshit should surprise nobody however, since you admit at the start to being a card carrying member of the Bullshit Party's A Team - the Republicans. Historically, they used to be the Democrats as far as their proclaimed mandate goes.
  
  What you support is anything that will create a greater balance in your off shore accounts, just as the democrats do - the Bullshit Party's B Team. A party which historically was once the Republican Party, as far as their proclaimed mandate goes.
  
  These "parties" are interchangeable, as they are simply private clubs composed of men and women who have already stolen millions from the public and desire more.
  
  The purpose of Government is to insure the wealthy have a large population to exploit, and the name of the government Party in power is meaningless. One gang of millionaires is identical in its desires and needs to any other gang of millionaires.
  
  This is why it was so easy to put in a ringer. The 2 party system was long ago corrupted to fulfill the desires of the wealthy at the expense of the citizens. The vote is a shell game, maintained as a placebo for the masses.
  
  The corporations needed to complete the rewrite of American Laws to allow them to double and triple their ability to steal from the public and Bush was not done when his stolen term was over.
  
  A ringer was needed because nobody in America would believe for one minute that another Republican was elected honestly after the destruction left by the 2 burning Bushes.
  
  The Vote Scam would have been blown wide open, and that scam was one the wealthy had no desire to lose, as it was the only thing keeping the masses from sticking their heads on pikes along main street.
  
  You are a businessman whose only desire is greater wealth.
  As with your business, you know that any lie that works is a good lie. You are obviously a successful businessman, but just as obviously, you know that what you wrote was nothing more than a good lie, and for most here, it will indeed work.
  
  America's - and indeed the world's - greatest problem is that the middle class has no desire to see an end to the excesses of the Upper Class, because they desire to someday BE the Upper Class.
  
  The only question here is - are you already a member of the ruling class, or are you simply another middle class wannabe who desires entry into that exclusive club, and are willing to do "whatever it takes" to get there?
  
  Rant over.
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Tom, 2 Mar 2014 @ 10:52am

The above was a reply to post #12 by zip.
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Is every government organization CROOKED?, 20 Mar 2014 @ 3:00am

"Honestly, isn't there enough hysteria surrounding the tens of thousands of NSA files...?"

Must be an NSA post, doing what they're hired to do.
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Is every government organization CROOKED?, 20 Mar 2014 @ 3:13am

Headlines:

Thanks Anti-Vax Loons: The Return Of The Measles And The Backlash Against Jenny McCarthy

Gee, what a great way to communicate that you're incredibly stupid and make me despise your site.

M.D. directed medical treatments are the leading cause of death in the US.

This is why Dr. Joel Wallach put out an audio years ago entitled, "Dead Doctors Don't Lie."

He still asks the question, "Why would you go to man to ask him how to live longer when the less than 57 year death of doctors proves they can't give you a answer that works?
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- Anonymous Coward, 27 Mar 2014 @ 1:54am
  
  Re:
  You are one fucked up fuck, you know that? So is your grammar!
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Peter Woojoin, 5 Apr 2014 @ 10:20pm

Woojoin.com
Totally right. Every group that presents a potential threat has been infiltrated. One trick is the insertion of agents amd provocateurs together. If Edward Snowden obtained the documents, then it is almost certain that they had been shared with NSA, he was an administrator for NSA's systems after all, not GCHQ's systems. In my opinion, internet should be destroyed completely, link to my article: http://woojoin.com/internet/
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John, 16 Apr 2014 @ 9:58am

What's with the logos
I've noticed a lot of logos are proudly displayed on these documents for these agencies.
What's the deal with secretive agencies creating easily identifiable logos for their organization? Isn't that counter-intuitive?

That said, they are all fairly easily tracked down accept for that Red & Blue on White one in the top left corner with the SD on it. If you try to zoom in on it, at the bottom it looks like it says "Intelligence Defense Effects" but not entirely certain due to the blurring on the letters.

Does anyone know what this logo is for? I have tried multiple searches and keep coming up empty.

Logos don't get placed on sensitive documents just because someone was bored. I suspect there is much more to this...
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anonymous, 25 Sep 2014 @ 10:52am

So organizations like NSA deliberately discredit people online?
By pretending to be other people? Seems far fetched doesn't it - like they'd actually have the time to do stuff like this. I myself have experienced something similar, followed around Walmart (they're obvious as well - poorly trained), they monitor[ed] my home PC using keyboard logging (I occasionally open a notepad and type "piss off" just in case anyone's watching), and so on and so forth. I would suggest that people within these out of control organizations are not following orders - for example there are a number of documented cases of NSA operatives using their powers/tools/ability-to-be-above-the-law as a way of stalking (er... monitoring) their ex-lovers after they had probably been dumped for being dillweeds.

What should we do? Weed out the idiots who somehow passed the rigid psychological testing and make sure they get canned, neutralized, sent back to the middle east, diego garcia, etc ... there are bad eggs - we can help by weeding them out. The sorts of folks who are currently committing acts of brutality in the police force - it's not a concerted effort by leadership to dictate.
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- davidbarcomb, 27 Nov 2014 @ 11:21pm
  
  Re: So organizations like NSA deliberately discredit people online?
  Very well said
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Nil, 6 Jan 2016 @ 8:28am

Just add your 'social media profile' and stir
Its one thing to have disinformation lost in the bowls of the older usenet, or a chat room, or an online forum, now you have this thing call social media profiles, which takes information from wherever it finds it, often going beyond the social media to construct its profiles.

These profiles are now the faddy tools for our employers, as well as instructions for your local community mobers, otherwise called gang stalkers.

From our internet 'trolls' and other social engineering operatives, to Gang Stalkers in one fowl swoop with you as the hapless by-stander, having having absolutely no say in the matter.

If that weren't bad enough, you have our blaimless A.i as inbetweener, collecting disinformation as facts, for others to respond to, sight unseen, no questions asked, no quarter given. If you wanted to create radicals, you couldn't invent a better system. Of course we don't deal in radicaLies.

This is big brother, as no one dared to imagine it.
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Margus Meigo Waffa, 13 Jan 2016 @ 1:27am

People You DO Realize that this is blueprint of basic Soviet and RED propacanda that USA leaked by using their project Snowdan so youth would be able to understand how propacanda works
This is not a cartoon.. and they use values of gentleman and higher intelligence and religion to play games with kid minded evils to save people from under their spell.

This is also the reason of many times mentioned @magicians@... Wizard tools more..
What You think how else should they save Your teenager minds from pentagram that is full packed hate, jealousy and violence with special TV tools and media where pentagram is in deep ? |

There is many dimensional things labors in USA and Russia working with, this in here is just simple explanations for common people, there is no @laking@ about it.. it was planned as it is planned for education for masses.
Just seems exotic for some because for them it was not basic to see and think these kind of levels, methods and tricks when 10 years old.

Seriously, we can do better much much better
But better does not always work better..
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