EU Parliament Calls On EU Countries To Drop All Charges Against Snowden, Protect Him From Extradition

from the well,-that's-interesting dept

The EU Parliament has just approved a measure (by a narrow 285 to 281 vote) telling EU member states to "drop any criminal charges against Edward Snowden, grant him protection and consequently prevent extradition or rendition by third parties, in recognition of his status as whistle-blower and international human rights defender." That's pretty huge. Of course, as a resolution, it's more symbolic than actually meaningful, because the member states may not follow through on the request. But it is an important step in the right direction.

At the same time, the EU Parliament reviewed some other issues concerning mass surveillance, including the whole EU-US safe harbor setup. As we noted, the EU Court of Justice recently tossed out that agreement, which is really creating a huge mess for the internet right now. The EU Parliament "welcomed" the ruling, and pushed for alternatives to the safe harbor agreement. As we noted, the safe harbor agreement was a bit of a mess, but it's important to have something in place to allow the internet to function -- and the real problem was the NSA surveillance program.

At the same time, of course, it's worth noting that surveillance by EU governments is just as bad (if not worse in many cases), and it seems the EU Parliament may be realizing that as well:

Parliament is concerned about "recent laws in some member states that extend surveillance capabilities of intelligence bodies", including in France, the UK and the Netherlands. It is also worried by revelations of mass surveillance of telecommunications and internet traffic inside the EU by the German foreign intelligence agency BND in cooperation with the US National Security Agency (NSA).

Simply blaming the NSA and the US for surveillance is missing the point. It's a pretty broad problem, where the NSA/US government is a huge part of the problem, but the EU doesn't exactly have clean hands either.

Again, as mere resolutions, these efforts have little binding authority, but at least people are coming to terms with the damage done and looking to move in the right direction. Declaring Snowden a whistleblower and protecting him against bogus legal threats and extradition would be a really huge step forward.

Filed Under: ed snowden, eu, eu parliament, extradition, mass surveillance, nsa, safe harbors, surveillance, whistleblowing

Snowden Treaty Launched: Effort To Get Countries To End Mass Surveillance

from the end-mass-surveillance dept

David Miranda (who you may recall from the time he was detained at Heathrow under the UK's anti-terrorism laws... for being a journalist and having some encrypted Ed Snowden documents on him) has recently been talking up a new project called the Snowden Treaty, which is an attempt to get an international treaty that would get countries to commit to ending mass surveillance.

The International Treaty on the Right to Privacy, Protection Against Improper Surveillance and Protection of Whistleblowers, or the Snowden Treaty, is a proposed international treaty for states that reaffirms and protects fundamental human rights – especially the right to privacy, a vital prerequisite for freedom of speech and association – in the context of the disturbing revelations by Edward Snowden. The treaty was developed by experts in international law and legal experts on Internet freedoms and surveillance.

Signatories to the treaty will be obliged to enact concrete changes to outlaw mass surveillance. The Treaty would also develop international protections for whistleblowers.

As well as being required to make changes to legislation and practices to end mass surveillance, signatory states also must consider data protection and the right to privacy in all future programs and policies. This will make the preservation of privacy a fundamental responsibility of governments, ensuring the protection of these fundamental human rights for generations to come.

Apparently the plan is to really hold any countries that sign on to this:

Oversight of state surveillance will also be stepped up. Signatories will be required to establish independent national supervision to ensure public transparency and accountability in their surveillance-related activities. They will also commit to undertaking comprehensive reviews of existing surveillance practices every 5 years, with their results made public.

The treaty greatly strengthens protections for whistleblowers above those already existing in international law. Whistleblowers will not be subject to sanctions for publicly releasing information with the reasonable intent of exposing wrongdoing. The treaty also commits signatories to take meaningful action to address violations of the right to privacy, access to information or to free and secure communications revealed by a whistleblower.

Whistleblowers will also be protected from the actions of non-signatories; by signing the treaty states guarantee the right of residence in their countries and embassies for people claiming to be persecuted as whistleblowers until the appropriate proceedings for permanent asylum have been carried out in full. This will overcome the problems Snowden faced when certain countries claimed they were unable to offer asylum until he applied for it from their soil

Of course, chances of the US signing on to this are basically nil, but it will be interesting to see if other countries think it's worth supporting. Countries that have tried to hold themselves out as bastions of free speech and against mass surveillance might make interesting targets. But, of course, actually getting countries to commit to such things isn't always easy. Still, the effort seems worthwhile, even if it merely raises the issue of what kind of world do we live in that such a thing should even be necessary?

Filed Under: david miranda, ed snowden, mass surveillance, privacy, snowden treaty, surveillance

Contractor Who Cleared Snowden For His NSA Position Fined $30 Million By The DOJ

from the can-only-assume-Snowden-received-a-cursory-examination dept

The government seems to have lost interest in finding anyone to hang for Snowden's all-access tour of the NSA's internal servers -- access that greatly aided in his absconding with a number of documents revealing the surprising extent of the agency's surveillance programs. It certainly still wants to hang Snowden -- literally, if some legislators get their way.

It has, however, decided to nail one handy scapegoat to the wall. This would be the contractor who allowed Snowden to get in the door in the first place. The Register's Shaun Nichols reports that the DOJ is fining US Investigative Services (USIS) $30 million for generally being completely terrible at the one thing it's supposed to be doing: vetting applicants for sensitive government jobs.

The DoJ announced on Wednesday that US Investigations Services (USIS) will give up a $30m (£19.14m) payment in exchange for settling charges that it violated the US False Claims Act by failing to properly screen applicants for government security clearances.

According to the DoJ, USIS failed to properly screen federal security clearance applicants and, in some cases, submitted incomplete background check reports to the US Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

The USIS wasn't simply mediocre. It was awful. Shortly after Snowden revealed himself as the source of the leaks, USIS was revealed to have riddled the government with security holes over most of the past decade. One contractor was caught interviewing dead people during background checks. Another singlehandedly submitted 1,600 falsified reports.

Then in January of last year, the revelations got even worse. The DOJ accused USIS of faking background checks on 665,000 federal employees -- something the DOJ understatedly called "taking shortcuts."

The USIS won't actually be paying this fine, however. It will instead work its debt off doing the DOJ's dishes doing the same thing it couldn't be trusted to do in the first place when it was still collecting a paycheck. Why this hasn't resulted in a permanent pink slip for the contractor is beyond me, but it does show the government's endless willingness to forgive… well, certain contractors.

Filed Under: contractor, doj, ed snowden, fine, nsa, security clearance
Companies: usis

Feds Keep Magically Finding Documents They Insisted Didn't Previously Exist

from the funny-how-that-works dept

We just wrote about a FOIA request where the government said there were no responsive documents, even though it had already released the very responsive document. It appears that this kind of thing is a common problem in the government -- and it doesn't seem to get solved until you sue the government. Here are two examples.

First up, Gawker had sought the email communications of Hillary Clinton deputy Philippe Reines, focused on his conversations with journalists. The State Department came back with a no responsive records reply, which was clearly bullshit, since Reines was known for regularly emailing reporters. So Gawker sued and guess what just happened: the State Department just magically found 17,855 emails that are likely responsive. How about that?

Next, we've got Vice, where "FOIA terrorist" Jason Leopold is employed. As you may remember, back in 2014, Ed Snowden claimed that he had made multiple attempts at raising concerns internally at the NSA. Eventually, the Director of National Intelligence released a single email between Snowden and the NSA's General Counsel, which was just asking a specific question. The NSA did hint (in a different FOIA request response) at the likelihood of there being more emails it didn't plan to release. Leopold sent a more specific FOIA request to the NSA... and was told there were "no responsive documents."

And, as he's done more than basically anyone, Leopold sued. And at a hearing in that case, the government is now admitting that there are three more emails that Snowden sent to the NSA's Oversight & Compliance Office, though the DOJ claims that none of these emails were actually raising questions about NSA surveillance. It's certainly possible that, in this case, it's true that there really were no more responsive documents, but the late addition noting these three other emails, once again, suggests that when sued, the government suddenly starts finding more documents than when directly asked under FOIA.

Filed Under: documents, doj, ed snowden, foia, hillary clinton, jason leopold, lawsuits, philippe reines
Companies: gawker, vice

White House Finally Answers Snowden Pardon Petition: The Only Good Whistleblowing Is Punished Whistleblowing

from the because-of-course-this-would-be-the-answer dept

The White House has finally responded -- more than two years later -- to a petition asking for a pardon of Edward Snowden. The petition surfaced soon after Snowden went public with his identity. Less than three weeks later -- June 25, 2013 -- it had passed the 100,000-signature threshold.

Understandably, the administration was in no hurry to respond to this petition. In the immediate aftermath of the first leaks, no entity was more unpopular than the NSA. Snowden, on the other hand, probably could have won a number of local elections as a write-in candidate at that point. So, the administration sat on it, as it has sat on a great many petitions not particularly aligned with its desires.

Unfortunately, the public's opinion hasn't shifted much. As other agencies have become more plaintive in their requests to undermine privacy and safety to keep criminals from "going dark," the public has become less and less enthusiastic about being forced to make more sacrifices in the interest of security. The NSA also hasn't become more popular in the interim. So buying time by cherry-picking We The People petitions to respond to hasn't made answering this petition any easier for the administration.

More than two years later -- 763 days past the point it became a viable petition -- the administration has answered. And the answer could have been written two years ago, as it refuses to acknowledge Snowden's contribution to recent surveillance reforms. The response was written by Lisa Monaco, the president's advisor on Homeland Security and Counterterrorism. Considering the source, the response is unsurprising. But it starts off with a lie:

Since taking office, President Obama has worked with Congress to secure appropriate reforms that balance the protection of civil liberties with the ability of national security professionals to secure information vital to keep Americans safe.

Wrong. The "appropriate reforms" have been forced into existence by leaked documents Snowden provided. This "conversation" the President keeps claiming he always wanted to have only took place because he could no longer ignore it. This opening sentence is worse than merely disingenuous. It's a complete rewrite of Obama's civil liberties legacy. Before the Snowden leaks, Obama's stance on surveillance was "whatever Bush did, only more."

Next, Monaco goes on to say that no matter how instrumental Snowden was in the recent surveillance reforms (without ever actually saying that), he's still a just a criminal and should be treated as one.

Instead of constructively addressing these issues, Mr. Snowden's dangerous decision to steal and disclose classified information had severe consequences for the security of our country and the people who work day in and day out to protect it.

Except that this administration is no friend to whistleblowers. Snowden knew this. Snowden also knew the "proper channels" were mostly there to ensure whistleblowers were silenced and punished. So he ran. This administration has prosecuted more whistleblowers than all other administrations combined. When Snowden took off, it was five years into Obama's presidency, plenty of time to gauge what sort of odds the "proper channels" offered.

From that point, Monaco goes on to claim that the only legitimate act of civil disobedience is a punished act of civil disobedience.

If he felt his actions were consistent with civil disobedience, then he should do what those who have taken issue with their own government do: Challenge it, speak out, engage in a constructive act of protest, and -- importantly -- accept the consequences of his actions. He should come home to the United States, and be judged by a jury of his peers -- not hide behind the cover of an authoritarian regime. Right now, he's running away from the consequences of his actions.

First off, this is wrong. As has been explained countless times, under the Espionage Act, which is what Snowden would be charged under, he is not allowed to present the evidence in his defense that he was blowing the whistle on an illegal program (and yes, it has been ruled illegal). Nor is he allowed to argue that the leak was in the public interest. In other words, the law is stacked such that he cannot present his argument fairly. The deck is stacked and Monaco knows the deck is stacked and ignores that -- which is exceptionally dishonest.

I would imagine Monaco -- and by extension, the administration -- would also feel that those who hacked Hacking Team are the real criminals here, not the company that sold surveillance software and zero-day exploits to governments known for widespread abuse of their citizens. "Look, we appreciate them highlighting these dubious and likely illegal contracts. But to move forward, we really need to put the hackers who obtained the documents on trial."

But, honestly, no one expected this response to go any other way. No one who holds the top office in the nation is going to sell out the rest of the government for a whistleblower. So, it could have saved everyone the trouble and posted this answer June 26, 2013.

Filed Under: ed snowden, espionage act, lisa monaco, nsa, obama administration, petition, surveillance, we the people

Chilling Effects: UK Police Admit To Investigating Journalists For Covering Snowden Leaks

from the freedom-of-the-press? dept

Remember back when UK law enforcement detained David Miranda while he passing through Heathrow airport for nine hours, under an anti-terrorism law, claiming that journalism could be terrorism? Apparently, UK law enforcement is really doubling down on that claim, with the new admission that there is an ongoing and open criminal investigation into the reporters who have published Snowden documents.

As you recall, the first such documents were obtained and published by Glenn Greenwald, an American living in Brazil but working for the UK's Guardian newspaper. There had been a number of bizarre reports about just how far UK law enforcement wanted to go to intimidate journalists from reporting on such leaks in the future -- even forcing the Guardian to physically destroy a laptop that had the Snowden documents for no good reason other than security theater.

But that kind of intimidation has been taken up a notch. Greenwald's new publication, the Intercept, has been engaged in an ongoing Freedom of Information battle with the Metropolitan Police Service in the UK to find out if that organization is investigating journalists, and the police have finally confirmed that they are, in fact, investigating journalists, though it only does so obliquely, but "confirming" that "it continues to conduct an investigation into the events as described above" (with the "above" being the details laid out in the Freedom of Information request).

Of course, it doesn't appear that the reporters actually did anything wrong, and thus it seems fairly clear that the entire reason for the investigation is to create chilling effects for journalists who might publish such stories in the future and to harass those who published them in the past. The current UK government's continued move to use Orwell's 1984 as a guidebook, rather than a warning sign, is really reaching ridiculous levels.

Filed Under: ed snowden, glenn greenwald, investigation, journalism, metropolitan police, uk

NY Times Falsely Claims ISIS Is Using Encryption & Couriers Because Snowden

from the like-they-never-thought-of-that-before dept

For quite some time now, the Snowden haters out there keep wanting to prove that Ed Snowden somehow caused damage with his leaks. It's been over two years now and they keep coming up empty. Former Senator and staunch surveillance state supporter Saxby Chambliss was out making claims yesterday about how when the US government "gets our hands on" Snowden, it should "hang him on the courthouse square." Because nothing says "freedom" like convicting someone without a trial and then killing them barbarically, right? But, Chambliss also claimed that "lives have been lost" because of Snowden, ridiculously comparing his leaks to the OPM leaks:

"Just like with Snowden, we’re going to lose American lives as result of this breach."

Going to? It's been two years and no one can point to a single life lost -- so this bit of fearmongering is stretching pretty thin at this point.

But, still, the Snowden fearmongering continues... with an assist from the NY Times. An article by Eric Schmitt and Ben Hubbard, about the latest on ISIS and how it's structured, contains a random nonsensical dig at Snowden:

The Islamic State has also studied revelations from Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, about how the United States gathers information on militants. A main result is that group’s top leaders now use couriers or encrypted channels that Western analysts cannot crack to communicate, intelligence and military officials said.

Except that a year ago, an actual study of how these groups communicate showed that they were already using such methods long before Snowden and nothing had changed in the aftermath. That research, by Flashpoint Partners, pointed out among other things:

• Well prior to Edward Snowden, online jihadists were already aware that law enforcement and intelligence agencies were attempting to monitor them. As a result, the Snowden revelations likely merely confirmed the suspicions of many of these actors, the more advanced of which were already making use of – and developing –secure communications software.
• The underlying public encryption methods employed by online jihadists do not appear to have significantly changed since the emergence of Edward Snowden.

And, of course, it's been well-known for years that Al Qaeda used couriers and encryption to avoid communications channels that could be easily monitored by the NSA, so it's not like ISIS needed Snowden to reveal what was already known. Here's an article from two months before anyone knew Ed Snowden's name, talking about Al Qaeda adapting to the NSA:

Suddenly al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula was up against the National Security Agency and the Predator drones that can hover out of sight and intercept phone calls.

So it adapted.

It went underground, enduring a monthslong U.S. led bombing campaign. It emerged as a more disciplined and professional organization. It ditched cell phones in favor of walkie-talkies and coded names. Information was passed through intermediaries. If someone needed to send an email, it was shielded by highly sophisticated encryption software.

Anyone who thinks that ISIS suddenly discovered the need for this kind of thing after Snowden is either lying or ignorant. The two NY Times reporters who should know better should never have included that bogus tidbit. It seems to serve no purpose other than to let anonymous government officials spread a lie about Snowden.

Filed Under: couriers, ed snowden, encryption, isis
Companies: ny times

Two Overlooked Aspects Of Those Leaks About NSA Spying On French Presidents

from the reasons-to-be-cheerful dept

There's been quite a lot of excitement in the press about the latest leaks that the NSA has been spying on not just one French President, but (at least) three of them. As Mike pointed out, this isn't such a big deal, because it is precisely the kind of thing that you would expect the NSA to do -- as opposed to spying on the entire US public, which isn't. There is, though, an aspect that most people have overlooked: the fact that these NSA leaks don't appear to originate from Snowden's stash.

Of course, Mr Crypto himself, Bruce Schneier, did spot it, and pointed out it could be one of his "other" US intelligence community leakers, listed a couple of months ago, or even a completely new one. As that post shows, there are now a few people around that are leaking secret documents, and that's a pretty significant trend, since you might expect enhanced security measures taken in the wake of Snowden's leaks would have discouraged or caught anyone who attempted to follow suit.

That's not the only thing that's interesting about the French documents. As Fabio Chiusi points out in a blog post (original in Italian), they are the latest in a recent series of very rich leaks that include the Sony archives; the Saudi cables; the TPP transparency chapter; and -- not mentioned by Chiusi -- 17 chapters from TISA.

What all those collections have in common is the fact that they came from WikiLeaks. As Chiusi rightly emphasizes, after a period when WikiLeaks seemed to have lost its ability to release important material -- and thus its relevance -- the organization is beginning to hit its stride again. Coupled with the fact that there are half-a-dozen or so people who are leaking intelligence materials, that development offers hope that things are really beginning to look up on the transparency front.

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Filed Under: ed snowden, leakers, leaks, nsa, other leakers, surveillance
Companies: wikileaks

Leaked Damage Assessment Shows Government Mostly Interested In Investigating Leakers, Withholding Information From Public

from the oh,-and-terrorists,-I-suppose dept

The Intercept has just released an interesting document from its Snowden stash: an unredacted damage assessment of the New York Times' 2005 exposure of the NSA's warrantless wiretapping program -- a program that saw the agency monitoring the emails and phone calls of US citizens.

It's not that the government hasn't made damage assessments public before. It just does it very, very rarely and mostly for self-serving reasons. The most recent publications of damage assessments were in response to the Snowden leaks. The released assessments were heavily-redacted and made plenty of unfounded assertions about the damage done to the national security infrastructure by the leaks.

This 2005 damage assessment was never released. It was purely an internal document. Thanks to it being part of Snowden's package of leaked documents, it can be read without the sort of excessive redaction the government deploys when discussing even the most inane (or obvious) aspects of national security.

Such was the internal distress at the possible exposure of this surveillance program that the government managed to delay its publication for a year. Despite its successful pushback, the assessment here is no different that the assessment of the Snowden leaks. In other words, mostly speculation backed by very little support.

The memo gives a general explanation of what terrorists might do in reaction to the information revealed. It was “likely” that terrorists would stop using phones in favor of mail or courier, and use encryption and code words. They could also plant false information, knowing the U.S. government was listening. But the leaked program had not “been noted in adversary communications,” according to the memo. It gave no specific examples of investigations or targets that had or might be impacted by the revelations.

Once you get past the obvious suggestion that terrorists will adapt communication methods in light of presumably-unknown information, you get to more detailed discussion of the NYT article itself. The assessment breaks down every statement of fact in the article and provides its corresponding level of classification.

(TS//SI//STLW//NF//OC) "President Bush secretly authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans and others inside the United States to search for evidence of terrorist activity."

(TS//SI//STL WIINF//OC) (NSA) "monitored the international telephone calls (communications to the U.S.) and international e-mail messages of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people inside the United States without warrants over the past three years … to track possible "dirty numbers" linked to Al Qaeda..."

(TS//SI//STLW//NF//OC) "NSA eavesdrops (under this program) without warrants on up to 500 people in the United States at any given time." ... the number monitored ... may have reached ... the thousands"

(S//SI) "Overseas, about 5,000 to 7,000 people suspected of terrorist ties are monitored (by NSA) at one time."

Oddly, the government considers the most obvious possible outcome of the exposure of this program (that terrorists would alter communications in light of this info) to be "classified."

(C) (The article) would alert would-be terrorists (inside the United States) that they might be under scrutiny.

If there was a battle for American hearts and minds to be fought in the wake of this publication, you'd think the agency would want this conclusion made public (preferably with some supporting evidence), rather than bury it with other classified documents.

Nearly a decade down the road, the government has yet to offer any solid proof that the New York Times' article resulted in compromised capabilities or surveillance programs.

“To this day we’ve never seen any evidence — despite all the claims they made to keep us from publishing — that it did any tangible damage to national security. This is further confirmation of that,” [New York Times writer Eric] Lichtblau told The Intercept.

In fact, the only clear response to the publication of this leaked info didn't take the form of altered collection techniques or additional terrorist attacks. It took the form of a full-blown DOJ investigation, involving 25 FBI agents and five prosecutors. This too, resulted in a whole lot of nothing.

The leak and the response to it indicates the government was more worried about US citizens, rather than its foreign adversaries, finding out about what it was up to.

Filed Under: 702, bulk collection, damage assessment, ed snowden, nsa, surveillance, warrantless wiretapping

Sunday Times Doubles Down On Government Stenography, Detailing Calls For Prosecution Following Its Own Debunked Story

from the that's-not-journalism dept

You might think that after publishing a high profile story that was widely mocked and debunked, the Sunday Times and its reporter Tom Harper might write a more thoughtful followup. Instead, it appears that they have doubled down on the original story by writing a followup (text here) that focuses on the actions of fear mongerers who believed their original propaganda unquestionably.

Last week, as you'll recall, we wrote about the absolutely ridiculous article in the Sunday Times, that made a bunch of dubious to outright false claims about the documents Ed Snowden passed along to reporters. The crux of the story was to suggest that Snowden either deliberately handed over the documents to the Russian and Chinese governments or that both governments had "cracked the encryption" Snowden used to lock up the documents. And, because of this, the Sunday Times claimed, UK intelligence "agents" were put at risk and had to be pulled out of Moscow. Nearly all of this was debunked by people who actually understood these issues, including a former diplomat from the UK and individuals who have access to the Snowden documents -- who noted that nothing in those documents revealed anything about intelligence resources like that. There were lots of other problems with the story as well, including the false assertion that David Miranda had travelled to Moscow to get documents from Snowden.

After the story was torn apart by basically everyone, the lead reporter on it, Tom Harper, appeared on CNN to defend the story, but only dug himself a deeper hole by flat out admitting "we just publish what we believe to be the position of the British government." In the interview he repeatedly admits he has no evidence. He has no proof at all, other than having one UK government official tell him this claim, and then confirming it with two other UK government officials. When pressed, Harper's editor, Martin Ivens, similarly responded that any questions about the story should be directed at the UK government, rather than the staff of the Sunday Times. In short, the Sunday Times was admitting that they were just publishing propaganda for the government and could not stand behind the actual story.

Given that, it would seem reasonable that the followup this week would, at the very least, explore the questions raised by the critics of the article. In fact, a good reporter or a real news organization might go back and start to explore their own reporting to see if they could actually confirm any of the details or to understand how they had ended up playing the role of the government stenographer. Instead... Tom Harper and his colleagues wrote a piece that basically follows the actions of those who believed their questionable reporting from last week, leading with this:

SCOTLAND YARD has been urged to investigate Edward Snowden, the fugitive American whistleblower, after it emerged that the government believes secret material he stole from British and US intelligence agencies has fallen into the hands of Russia and China.

Liam Fox, the former defence secretary, has written to Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Metropolitan police commissioner, asking his officers to examine the "great potential damage to the national security of the United Kingdom" caused by the former analyst, who used to work for America's CIA and National Security Agency (NSA).

Ken Macdonald, a former director of public prosecutions, also said that leaking the material, which contains details of sensitive intelligence techniques and information that could allow British and American spies to be identified, could trigger prosecutions for "any number of offences" under anti-terrorism laws.

Of course, the idea that Liam Fox is whining about "great potential damage" to national security is really rich, given that a big part of the reason why he's the former defense secretary was that he was accused of giving a buddy of his tremendous access to the government, leading to an investigation that he "jeopardised national security and raised issues around conflicts of interest."

But, really, to base an entire article on some hard line surveillance state apologist making claims based on his faulty reliance on your own bogus article? That's... incredible. I had no idea the role of the press was to create a false controversy, and then try to confirm the bogus controversy by believing the fools who believed your bogus reporting.

Meanwhile, it appears the only acknowledgement of the problems in last week's story were buried in a tiny correction in the physical paper (and not mentioned in this new story) about the blatantly false claim about David Miranda visiting Snowden in Moscow: If you can't see that, it says:

The article "British spies betrayed to Russians and Chinese" (News, last week) stated that David Miranda had visited Edward Snowden in Moscow. This is incorrect and we apologise for the error.

That's it. No mention of the other problems with the story, or (more importantly) that the entire story kind of hung on this particular detail. Oh, and apparently each week this story goes on, the Sunday Times is required to include a factually incorrect statement about Snowden in Moscow. Last week it was the Miranda visit. This week, it's that Snowden supposedly fled to Russia to seek the protection of Putin.

He eventually fled to Moscow to seek the protection of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, after America cancelled his passport.

Except, that's not true. He was stranded in Moscow after the US pulled his passport. He was only in Moscow because it was en route to his actual destination in Latin America.

In this latest article, the only acknowledgement of the concerns raised by last week's ridiculous article is this:

However, Snowden's supporters reacted with fury, claiming that the government was trying to smear the former NSA worker and bolster support for new laws that would govern the interception of communications.

No mention of how many of the details and claims in the article were called into question. No mention of how the terminology was wrong. No mention of anything like that. But there was Tom Harper patting Tom Harper on the back for his own bogus scoop:

Last week, The Sunday Times revealed that Downing Street now believes Moscow and Beijing have gained access to some of the estimated 1.7m encrypted files stolen by Snowden, forcing MI6 to pull agents out of operations in hostile countries.

I guess Tom Harper and the Sunday Times have decided that if they're going to be the government's propaganda rag, they might as well go all in. And what better way to cover up last week's failures than to report on the actions of those who fell for it last time around. With that as the basis for future "reporting" they can continue the nonsense indefinitely.

Filed Under: ed snowden, liam fox, martin ivens, sunday times, tom harper, uk