US Defense Official Says Intelligence Agencies Need To 'Grow Up' And Stop Blaming Snowden For Their ISIS-Tracking Problems

from the who-would-have-suspected-cellphones-of-being-gov't-snitches? dept

The NSA's apologists have long claimed that Snowden's leaks have given America's many terrorist enemies the upper hand by informing them of super-secret means and methods.

Others have argued a bit more rationally that, if anything, Snowden's leaks have only confirmed what was widely suspected -- that the NSA (and its Five Eyes allies) had access to a vast amount of data and communications. It may have filled in a few missing details and warned them away from buying American hardware and software, but by and large, didn't result in completely overhauled communications systems.

An article for the Daily Beast written by Shane Harris and Noah Shachtman adds a few more voices to this discussion. It opens with intelligence officials discussing the difficulty they're having keeping tabs on ISIS.

In addition to encryption that American officials say has proven very difficult to crack, ISIS is also using a commercially available service that permanently deletes messages sent via the Internet, making them nearly impossible to intercept, according to an individual who was briefed on the issue Thursday.

More details are offered, including the unsurprising fact that the terrorist group considers cellphones to be inherently untrustworthy.

[I]SIS is practicing tight controls on their communications, especially at the top of the organization.

“These guys have a level of discipline. They will enforce through the ranks not using cellphones,” said the individual who was briefed on ISIS counter-surveillance techniques. The group has also used couriers to convey some messages in order to avoid digital communications altogether.

But those more directly involved with targeting and fighting ISIS note that none of this is unusual.

“Past that first day or two of easy targets, ISIS predictably dispersed into the civilian population. They quit using high-power radios, satellite and cellphones, starting moving to a dispersed command and control model,” [analyst Christopher] Harmer said.

Those expressing panic over the terrorists going dark routinely fail to note the upside -- that severing more predictable lines of communication to avoid surveillance takes its toll on internal coordination. Time-sensitive operations may be damaged by the shift to a much slower "sneakernet" and the further scattering of key members by US attacks further compromises efficiency.

But the narrative that lays the difficulty of tracking ISIS at Snowden's feet is, at the very least, misguided.

“It’s wrong to say because of Snowden our fight with ISIS is harder,” said one U.S. defense official with extensive experience battling al Qaeda and other militant groups. For more than a decade, intelligence agencies have been using electronic surveillance to locate terrorists, a fact that obviously hasn’t eluded ISIS, he said. “I’m not in any way defending Snowden.But I think our intel agencies need to grow up.”

Other officials note that one of the only changes they've observed has nothing to do with encryption or otherwise securing communications. This was already happening. What has vanished, however, is chatter on public channels.

“Post-Snowden, they took a lot of the opsec [operational security] discussions off of the public forums,” said Christopher Ahlberg, the CEO of Recorded Future, a data analysis firm backed by the investment arm of the U.S. intelligence community, among others. Those public forums included websites and chat rooms where ISIS members exchanged ideas for strategy and shared tactics.

Better opsec should be expected from any organization the longer it's in existence. This shift away from public channels would likely have happened even without Snowden's leaks. If anything, the leaks sped up this process. But they can hardly be considered solely -- or even largely -- responsible for terrorists' surveillance-dodging techniques.

Filed Under: blame, defense department, ed snowden, intelligence, isis, surveillance

DailyDirt: Correlations For Being Smart

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

If there were some simple things you could do that would make you smarter, you'd do them, right? Unfortunately, it's difficult to guarantee that a particular activity will actually cause you to be smarter. If you'll settle for a nice correlation, though, there are plenty of things to try! Here are just a few.

• People who stay up late and wake up late (aka night owls) seem to be smarter than people who go to sleep early and wake up early. People who are skeptical of this statement are even smarter. [url]
• A study published in JAMA Pediatrics reports that breast-fed babies have measurably higher IQ scores by age 7. Just wait for the manufacturers of infant formula to sponsor another study.... [url]
• College kids who want a slightly higher GPA should join a gym. When hearing this, the smart students ask, "Does just paying for a membership count?" [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: babies, causation, correlation, gym membership, intelligence, iq, night owls, parenting, smarter

DailyDirt: Boosting Brainpower

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

The plot of the classic science fiction short story, Flowers for Algernon has been adapted into a wide range of other stories, TV shows and movies. Upgrading a person's intelligence through some unnatural means provides a temporary fix -- resulting in an addiction to intelligence augmentation (or other complications). In reality, some colleges are starting to deal with students abusing drugs meant to treat ADHD but which also seem to increase mental focus in general. However, other methods that don't use prescription medication to boost brainpower might be harder to regulate. Here are just a few links on the subject of boosting brainpower.

• The number of people playing around with trans-cranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is growing -- because zapping your brain with a few volts seems harmless when the upside could be faster learning or relief from anxiety. People experimenting on themselves with about $20 worth of simple electronics could lead to some cool discoveries.. or a lobotomized population of internet users. [url]
• People use way more than 10% of their brain capacity. And 37% of all statistics are completely fabricated. [url]
• Bacteria that live in our intestines could have a significant influence on our brain chemistry. The microbes that live in our bodies are not well studied, but maybe someday researchers will try to engineer bacteria to symbiotically boost our brains. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: adhd, brain, brainpower, flowers for algernon, intelligence, iq, microbiome, symbiosis, tdcs, trans-cranial direct current stimulation

House Reauthorizes Intelligence Community Funding; Refuses To Consider Amendments To Limit Domestic Surveillance

from the because-of-course dept

This is hardly a surprise given the events of the past few weeks, but the House on Friday passed legislation to authorize intelligence activities for the next year. It sailed through easily, 345 to 59. While a number of Representatives, including Zoe Lofgren, Justin Amash and Rush Holt attempted to make amendments that would do things like stop the NSA from adding back doors to encryption, or beef up whistleblower protections, I imagine it will surprise none of you to discover that the Rules Committee did not allow those amendments to come up for a vote.

Notably, those three Reps whose amendments were ignored also voted against the overall reauthorization. It's interesting to note that Rep. Sensenbrenner voted against the reauthorization as well, though it's not clear why. Rep. Alan Grayson actually introduced a bunch of amendments to curb the NSA's powers, none of which were allowed, but he still voted in favor of the overall authorization. In the end, this reauthorization was going to go through one way or the other, so this isn't a huge surprise. With the failure of most of what was good in the USA Freedom Act in the House, it quickly became clear that the House wasn't going to fix things any time soon.

Filed Under: amendments, funding, intelligence, justin amash, reauthorization, rush holt, zoe lofgren

DailyDirt: For The Birds

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Birds have long been a source of fascination for humankind, and remain one of the few classes of animals with an entire hobby community dedicated to simply watching them. Of course, there are a hell of a lot of types of birds, and most come with complex and intriguing behaviours and characteristics that are unique to them, and which we keep discovering whenever we watch a little longer. Here are just a few examples.

• It turns out parrots name their children, and those names stick for life. Parrots aren't the first animals discovered to use names, but their unique ability to mimic human speech seems to make everything they do doubly interesting. [url]
• Lots of birds choose long-term mates — but lots of them get divorced, too. The albatross is the most faithful, while flamingo couples break up 99% of the time. [url]
• Researchers have sequenced the golden eagle's genome, and made new discoveries about how it sees and smells. The mapping will aid conservation efforts, both by helping develop strategies to reduce deaths from things like wind turbines and by providing genetic marker data for tracking populations. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: animal cognition, biology, birds, brains, intelligence, parrot, smart animals, tool

DailyDirt: Animal Brains Aren't So Different...

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

If you watch pets closely enough and for long enough, you might get a sense that animals can understand certain cues from people and that they sometimes try to communicate their wishes to people. Certainly not all pets are intelligent, but it's a common experience for many people. Wild animals aren't so different from their domesticated cousins, so it should maybe not be surprising that various wild animals are intelligent in some ways. Here are just a few links on the growing evidence of advanced animal cognition.

• A bunch of dogs were trained to sit still in a functional magnetic resonance imaging brain scanner, and their brain scans show that dog brains have a special area dedicated to processing voices and meaningful sounds. Dogs and people have remarkably similar brain reactions to happy sounds (eg. baby giggles) and unhappy sounds (eg. coughing) which could partly explain why our species get along so well. [url]
• PBS has a 3-part NOVA series -- Inside Animal Minds -- on the intelligence of animals. The 3-hour series covers tool use, communication skills, emotional intelligence, problem-solving abilities and social behaviors of a variety of wild and domesticated animals. [url]
• Pigeons can learn to categorize various items and exhibit selective attention. Laboratory pigeons were able to distinguish computer-generated images and respond with appropriate pecking on a touchscreen. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: animal cognition, animal intelligence, behavior, biology, brains, fmri, intelligence, mind, pigeons, smart animals

Former CIA Boss, Task Force Member Says Even Though Metadata Collection Hasn't Been Useful, It Should Be Expanded

from the huh? dept

We've pointed out that one of the big surprises in the White House's task force proposals on NSA reform, was that the task force was pretty clear that the NSA had absolutely nothing to support the claims that the Section 215 (of the PATRIOT Act) bulk metadata collection had been even remotely helpful. Multiple members of the task force have discussed how shocked they were to find the lack of any "there" there. As we noted, law professor Geoffrey Stone expressed his shock to NBC:

“It was, ‘Huh, hello? What are we doing here?’” said Geoffrey Stone, a University of Chicago law professor, in an interview with NBC News. “The results were very thin.”

While Stone said the mass collection of telephone call records was a “logical program” from the NSA’s perspective, one question the White House panel was seeking to answer was whether it had actually stopped “any [terror attacks] that might have been really big.”

“We found none,” said Stone.

Meanwhile, Richard Clarke, former anti-terrorist czar to multiple presidents, expressed similar surprise in an interview with On The Media. When asked about that program, he noted that the task force had been given security clearance to go through all of the data and all of the cases where Section 215 data was used, and:

"we came to the conclusion it was not necessary in any case where it was used."

Throughout all of this, I'd been kind of curious to hear where task force panel member Michael Morell came down on all of this. He was the most suspect member of the task force, having been the acting director of the CIA until just a little while before the task force was put together. In other words, he was an ultimate intelligence community insider, and I kind of wondered if he had been a dissenting voice on some of this, overruled by the others.

Well, Morell is now speaking out, and while it's not clear if he was overruled, he is trying very, very hard to spin the proposals and findings over Section 215 into something very different, almost directly in contrast with the statements from Stone and Clarke. Specifically, he is arguing that even though the bulk data collection has been useless he's sure it could be useful in the future if allowed to continue. Actually, he goes beyond that, saying that what would be even more useful is if they added back bulk metadata collection around email, the program that had been stopped back in 2011, as even the NSA itself had admitted it had little to no value. But Morell supports them both, because he thinks that maybe it'll be helpful in the future.

"I would argue actually that the email data is probably more valuable than the telephony data," Morell told National Journal in a telephone interview. "You can bet that the last thing a smart terrorist is going to do right now is call someone in the United States."

Morell also said that while he agreed with the report's conclusion that the telephone data program, conducted under Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, made "only a modest contribution to the nation's security" so far, it should be continued under the new safeguards recommended by the panel. "I would argue that what effectiveness we have seen to date is totally irrelevant to how effective it might be in the future," he said. "This program, 215, has the ability to stop the next 9/11, and if you added emails in there it would make it even more effective. Had it been in place in 2000 and 2001, I think that probably 9/11 would not have happened."

This is ridiculous on multiple levels. The idea that more data collection would have stopped 9/11 has already been thoroughly debunked by Michael German, who went through the 9/11 Commission report, showing that the intelligence community actually had already collected more than enough info to discover the plot -- they just failed to do anything with the information. And, in fact, that's a key part of the problem: adding more data to the pile actually makes it harder to understand that data. This is why it's silly for NSA defenders to keep talking about "needles and hay stacks." The point of the needle and the haystack is that the more hay you have, the harder it is to find the needle.

Furthermore, it takes some kind of logic to argue that a program that's been in existence for years, with not a single success to show for it, should be kept up (and expanded) just because it might be useful somehow in the future. Elsewhere, Morell faithfully repeated the NSA's other big talking point about how none of what it's doing is "spying on Americans."

“I think that is a perception that's somehow out there. It is not focused on any single American. It is not reading the content of your phone calls or my phone calls or anybody else's phone calls. It is focused on this metadata for one purpose only and that is to make sure that foreign terrorists aren't in contact with anybody in the United States,” said Michael Morell on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

While some people do think that (and, for what it's worth, it does appear that the NSA is collecting such content on many people, including Americans, through other programs), people are just as concerned about the metadata collection -- as has been clearly explained many times over. Besides, the report that Morell himself was a part of seems to indicate the quite reasonable concern that this data could be seriously abused.

It's interesting to see Morell try to spin his own report, but the words of his fellow panelists show what's really going on. Section 215 hasn't done anything useful. Morell's idea of expanding it and claiming it might do something useful in the future is based on nothing other than the general desire of the intelligence community, which Morell is a part of, to always suck up as much information as possible, no matter what the consequences or harm it may cause.

Filed Under: bulk metadata collection, cia, geoffrey stone, intelligence, michael morell, nsa, richard clarke, section 215, task force

Is The White House Task Force On Intelligence Report An Attempt To Stall Constitutional Analysis And Congressional Reforms?

from the the-chess-game-continues dept

While many of us were surprised at the details of the White House's intelligence task force's proposals on reforming the surveillance system, Marcy Wheeler is already wondering if part of the reason for the White House to release this now, ahead of schedule, is to try to cut off the judicial reviews of the constitutionality of the various programs, as well as the legislative reforms winding their way through Congress. She argues that the report gives the President cover to delay many of these things, and even, potentially, ward off a full constitutional review in the courts -- such that things like the "third party doctrine" (allowing the government to get data from third parties without a warrant) never fully get tested again in court:

So long as the President deliberates on whether to accept these recommendations (which make changes but have obvious loopholes), he'll also buy time for DOJ to decide how to respond to these suits. Most important, for them, will be to protect the Third Party doctrine (which allows them to get information from telecoms and banks and other businesses), even if it means mooting the lawsuits by shifting the phone dragnet back to the providers.

I also think the first half (or so) of these recommendations are designed to moot the Leahy-Sensenbrenner bill (FREEDOM). Even if Obama accepted all the recommendations that parallel Leahy-Sensenbrenner (that would affect the phone dragnet, other bulk collection, National Security Letters, back door searches, and other use of incidentally collected US person data), it would still preserve Executive prerogative to resume such practices. They're not going to do that, mind you, but this will likely stall the debate over Leahy-Sensenbrenner until after Obama makes his decision on what to accept and reject.

All of that may be true -- and is a concern to monitor. But, at the very least, we're seeing increasingly mounting pressure for President Obama to enact real changes to these programs, rather than just defending them blindly.

Filed Under: intelligence, nsa, reform, surveillance, task force, white house

Surprise: White House's Intelligence Review Task Force Suggestions Much More Than Just Cosmetic

from the wasn't-expecting-that dept

Given the earlier reports suggesting that the "independent" task force set up to review the NSA's activities had come back with a list of suggestions for changes that were mostly cosmetic, rather than substantive, it was a bit of a surprise to see the White House come out today to say that those earlier reports were incorrect and that they were releasing the report in full today (way ahead of schedule). And, now the report is out. After giving it a single read (300+ pages), it is a lot more substantial than many of us expected -- so much so that even the NSA's biggest apologists are "shocked" at how "awkward" it must be for the White House to claim to set up an independent task force, and then have it come back with recommendations that are quite different than what the White House itself has been proposing. It's as if the NSA's apologists assumed this was long in the bag, and that the task force itself was always a joke. Turns out that's not the case.

That's not to say this is perfect. There are significant areas where it seems the recommendations could and should go much further. But it does argue for reining in significant amounts of surveillance, providing much greater oversight, protecting non-US persons' privacy as well as US persons, and a variety of other very real changes. It also (as Judge Leon did on Monday) says that there's no real evidence the bulk collection of metadata was useful in any real way... but, oddly, then allows the program to continue, but in a different manner: having the telcos retain the data in case it's later needed (along with relevant court approvals) rather than just keeping the whole database to troll through. There are all sorts of problems with mandatory data retention as well, but we'll talk about that eventually.

It recommends putting significant restrictions on the ability of the FISA court to force companies to disclose private information, and also includes restrictions on the regularly abused "national security letters" process, which the FBI frequently uses to get information without a warrant. It supports much greater transparency about the programs, including allowing companies to reveal details of the number of requests they received for information. And, as mentioned above, they don't just stop at protecting the privacy of US persons, but non-US as well, including that any spying on non-US persons needs to have a direct national security purpose, and cannot be based on political or religious views alone. It also recommends against revealing information about non-US persons, such as the reported plans to leak the porn viewing habits of certain non-terrorists with views with which the American government disagreed.

The report clearly notes the drift by the NSA away from its core mission of national security, and suggests that various actions need to get back to having a specific national security reason. It also argues for splitting up parts of the NSA by designating the NSA itself as only covering foreign intelligence, moving its "Information Assurance Directorate" and (as we'd discussed last week) finally separating US Cyber Command from the NSA (something the White House has apparently already rejected). The report highlights the need for greater privacy assurances, including reconstituting the Civil Liberties Oversight Board into the Civil Liberties and Privacy Protection Board -- and granting it much more power for oversight, while also placing a Special Assistant to the President for Privacy in the executive branch. As many had expected, it also recommends making the FISA court a more adversarial process (something the White House has suggested it may be open to).

The report also recommends that the NSA be blocked from trying to undermine or weaken encryption standards, and actually says that the White House should support greater use of encryption across the board.

There are recommendations to better lock down information within the intelligence community to prevent another Snowden from walking off with documents... but also more avenues for whistleblowers, including having them go to that newly constituted privacy board.

It's final recommendation is one that's most telling, and one of the issues that's most confused me throughout this process. It suggests that the government start actually doing a "cost-benefit" analysis of the various security efforts it engages in. As we've noted, the incredible thing about the revealed programs is that they provided very little benefit, but the costs were astounding, both in managing the programs themselves, but, more importantly, in the impact economically and diplomatically of having those programs revealed.

Now, this report is just a set of proposals, which the White House can reject. In fact, it's likely that many will be rejected or ignored. But, to actually have this review board -- which many expected to be nothing more than yet another rubber stamp -- issue something this detailed, comprehensive... and which really does recommend some very real changes, is a pleasant surprise.

Your move, Mr. President.

Filed Under: bulk metadata collection, fisa court, fisc, intelligence, nsa, nsa surveillance, review, section 215, surveillance, task force

DailyDirt: Smart Primates

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

It shouldn't be too surprising that primates (besides humans) can exhibit some pretty amazing complex behavior. We haven't quite managed to get enough skilled (real, not virtual) monkeys together with typewriters to reproduce the works of Shakespeare, but maybe they just need iPads and touchscreen keyboard input (because who hasn't gotten frustrated with a typewriter?). The more we watch our genetic cousins, the more we see how smart they are -- and could be. Here are just a few examples of smart monkeys.

• Capuchin monkeys are known to be social and cooperative animals, but it's still fascinating that when they observe humans acting selfishly, they'll reject offers of food from these 'dangerous' humans. The conclusion that these monkeys avoid selfish people might be a bit simplified, but this study adds to the evidence that monkeys can recognize fairness. [url]
• Chimpanzees know how to eat better than some people -- since these primates apparently eat certain foods at optimal times of the day when the nutritional benefit of their food is at its peak. Chimps may not consciously know that they're eating in a healthy way, but their dietary habits get them to eat various leaves near the end of a day when the sugar content of those leaves are highest. [url]
• Monkeys at New York City's Central Park Zoo have been observed whispering behind the back of a (human) zoo supervisor. Apparently, these monkeys hate this guy and had previously harassed him with loud screaming, but now they've been recorded whispering (and plotting?) behind his back after he leaves. (insert sinister music) [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: animals, behavior, capuchin, chimpanzee, chimps, intelligence, monkeys, primates, smart