Keith Alexander Tells Senators He Can't Think Of Any Other Way To Keep The US Safe Other Than Bulk Metadata Collections

from the oh,-he-knows-other-ways...-he-just-doesn't-like-them dept

NSA head Gen. Alexander once again appeared before the Senate to defend his agency's actions and to deliver the talking points in an effort to head off a number of pieces of legislation aimed at rolling back the NSA's powers.

If the NSA has a chance to hold off what now appears to be near inevitable, it will need to update its rhetorical ploys. Alexander offered nothing much in the way of new arguments, which is only going to hurt the agency's position. It looks as though the old stuff isn't really working anymore. His assertion that the Section 215 program has led to 50+ terrorist attacks averted has disintegrated. Sen. Leahy raised additional questions about the efficiency of the 702 program (internet metadata) in the hunting terrorists. No answer was forthcoming but the agency head implied it would take much longer than next Wednesday's hearing to come up with an answer.

No surprises here either, as Gen. Alexander almost literally played the 9/11 card.

"Metadata is a way of knowing where those books are in the library, and a way of focusing our collection... to knowing, where are the bad books," Alexander says.

He holds up an index card – it's meant to be an old-style card-catalog card (sorry, millennials) – on which are listed the categories of information encompassed by "metadata": time, date, duration, contact numbers.

Then he returns to the 9/11 attacks and says, as he always does, that the attack might have been stopped by a metadata collection program like the USA has now.

Might have been. Except it wasn't. Sen. Leahy called Alexander out for using this tired ploy.

Leahy jumps in and says the failure to prevent the 9/11 attacks also has been put down to a failure to communicate within the intelligence community. US agents had the info they needed, they just failed to share it with one another.

There's no tread left on those tires, General. The Guardian points out this is the first time Alexander has been interrupted while deploying the "could have prevented 9/11" argument.

This wasn't the only used-up rhetoric Alexander deployed. He defended the bulk collections by claiming he "didn't know" a "better" way to protect Americans from terrorism.

"I don't know a better way to do it,” he said. "It's like holding onto a hornets' nest. We're getting stung. You've asked us to do this for the good of the nation … nobody's thought of a better way. We can't let the nation down."

That was Alexander's justification. There's no other way but a bulk, untargeted metadata collection containing millions of records of non-suspects.

But when Alexander says there's no other way to keep Americans safe, he's (no surprise) lying. There is another way and Alexander knows it because the NSA was forced (by the FISA court) to accomplish the task of fighting terrorism without being given access to millions of non-relevant phone records. FISA Judge Walton's orders, which followed on the heels of the admission of widespread abuse of the Section 215 collections, forced the NSA to seek court approval just to search what had previously been collected.

Since the March 5, 2009 FISA Court order, the Court's approval has been required for each selector before it is tasked for BR FISA metadata analysis. On Mar 21 NSA resumed manual access to BR FISA metadata, allowing chaining [redacted] of FISA Court-approved selectors associated with [redacted] following multiple operational and technical reviews to ensure compliance.

As Judge Walton noted then, the collection itself seemed to be overkill and prone to abuse.

The minimization procedures… have been so frequently and systemically violated that it can fairly be said that this critical element of the overall BR regime has never functioned effectively.

Nearly all of the call detail records collected pertain to communications of non-US persons who are not the subject of an FBI investigation… [or] are communications of US persons who are not the subject of an FBI investigation… and are data that otherwise could not be legally captured in bulk by the government.

So, there are other ways to accomplish this and the agency has had to work within stricter limitations in the past. The multiple flaws in Alexander's assertions are highlighted in this statement. Most of what's collected isn't pertinent to investigations and is, in fact, bordering on illegal. The only thing saving Alexander's favorite collection is some very favorable readings of the Third Party Doctrine and secret interpretations of the laws governing these data hauls.

Legislative efforts being made aim to roll back some of this power, something Alexander can't bear to see happen. If nothing else, a neutral storage site that can only be accessed by court-aprroved RAS selectors would be a start. But according to the chief spy, these limitations would lead to another 9/11. He wants it all and he wants unfettered access. There are other ways of compiling and searching metadata. Alexander knows this, but he has no interest in a more targeted approach.

This is Alexander's "hornet nest." Any stings he collects while handling it are solely his fault. If he doesn't like the pain associated with handling the hornet's nest, maybe he shouldn't have fought so hard to keep holding it.

Filed Under: 9/11, bulk data collection, fud, keith alexander, nsa, surveillance, terror

Feinstein And Rogers Try To Scare Americans With Ooga Booga Terrorism Threats

from the halloween-was-a-month-ago dept

It appears that the heads of the Senate and House Intelligence Committees, Senator Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Mike Rogers, are recognizing that their strategy for keeping their co-dependent relationship with the NSA going is failing and that the American public and an increasingly large segment of Congress no longer believes their bogus claims. Perhaps that's because every time they open their mouths, it takes all of about an hour before many of their claims are completely debunked, if not outright mocked for obviously being bogus. So their latest strategy? To basically yell "Ooga Booga Terrorists!" as loud as they can to try to scare people based on absolutely nothing.

Feinstein and Rogers did a little dance on Sunday political TV shows insisting that "the terrorism threat is increasing" and we're all going to die if we stop trying to make sure the NSA actually, you know, respects the Constitution. Asked if we were "safer" now than a year or two years ago, Feinstein kicked off the FUD:

“I don’t think so,” Feinstein replied. “I think terror is up worldwide, the statistics indicate that. The fatalities are way up. The numbers are way up. There are new bombs, very big bombs. Trucks being reinforced for those bombs. There are bombs that go through magnetometers. The bomb maker is still alive. There are more groups than ever. And there is huge malevolence out there.”

And Rogers quickly followed:

“I absolutely agree that we’re not safer today for the same very reasons,” he said. “So the pressure on our intelligence services to get it right to prevent an attack are enormous. And it’s getting more difficult.”

Of course, Feinstein's claim that "terror is up worldwide" is -- as is so often the case with her (and Rogers') claims about terrorism -- sorta true, but highly misleading. Yes, recent stats show an uptick in terrorist attacks and fatalities in 2012 -- but you can also see that it's highly variable. Earlier in the year, before the 2012 numbers came out, people were commenting on the fact that terror attacks and fatalities around the globe had been on the decline since 2007. Terrorism is highly variable and dependent on a few big successful attacks. Furthermore, if we look at attacks on the US, we find that there have basically been next to none in the US since 2001. You could make the case that 16 people have died in US "terrorist" attacks since 2001 (including the 13 soldiers killed by Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood), but you have to have a very broad definition of terrorism to do so.

Nearly all of the "terrorist" attacks in that original report that Feinstein is obviously relying on, appear to take place in areas that are considered war zones: Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. And, um, I hate to bring this part up, but part of the reason why those are war zones is because, you know, the US invaded both places. This isn't to say that there aren't terrorists out there who would like to attack the US. There clearly are. But it seems highly misleading to make the claims that both Feinstein and Rogers are making here, as the "data" they're talking about don't show any heightened risk in the US at all.

Either way, this whole thing -- having both appear together, both making vague "we're all going to die" statements without any details to back it up combined with an exceptionally misleading use of statistics -- suggests that this is the typical FUD. It's Feinstein and Rogers shouting "terror" in a crowded theater, because they know that they've already lost public opinion on this, and are quickly losing Congress as well.

Filed Under: dianne feinstein, fud, mike rogers, nsa, surveillance, terrorists

Keith Alexander Still Playing Bogus Fear Card: 'People Will Die' Because Of Snowden Leaks

from the people-are-going-to-die dept

Keith Alexander just can't resist playing the "fear card" when it comes to the Snowden leaks. His latest move is to insist people will die:

Terrorists “listen, they see what has come out in the press and they adjust,” Gen. Alexander said. He said the damage from the leaks is irreversible. “I believe people will die because we won’t be able to stop some of those threats.”

Let's face facts: the NSA cannot and will not stop all attacks. It totally missed the Boston Marathon bombing, for example, even if (ridiculously) it now likes to cite that as one of its "successes" because it was able to make sure that other attacks weren't likely to follow. Yes, people will die from terrorist attacks. That's what happens. The NSA is never going to be 100% successful in stopping attacks. That's the nature of the game. In fact, it's not clear that the NSA has a particularly good track record at stopping attacks at all. But, going further, just because there are some threats, it doesn't mean we throw the 4th Amendment out the window the way Alexander apparently would like.

As I've said before, I'm sure law enforcement would be able to stop lots of crimes -- and potentially some people getting killed -- if it was just able to put a video camera and microphone everywhere. But we don't allow that, because the tradeoff in terms of a violation of our privacy is too great.

Furthermore, that bullshit line about terrorists "adjusting" based on what they read in the press? That might (though, not really) have some weight if others in the intelligence community hadn't already noted that terrorists already know all of this and avoided using these systems, and the fact that the NSA hasn't been able to actually show how any of these programs were essential in stopping a terrorist attack on the US.

Having followed pretty closely what the Snowden docs have revealed, it's not at all clear how any of it would actually make it more difficult for the NSA to do its job. It basically revealed that they're tapping a bunch of things that most people realized weren't particularly secure in the first place.

For all the talk of having a "serious debate" on these issues, it would help a lot of Keith Alexander and James Clapper dropped the whole "you're all going to die" charade. No one's buying it.

Filed Under: ed snowden, fud, keith alexander, nsa, nsa surveillance

NSA Complains That It Has To Spend Time Closing Leaks Rather Than Spying On Everyone

from the missing-the-point dept

NPR has a slightly bizarre article claiming that the effects of the Snowden leaks "aren't what he intended." Except the article doesn't really suggest that at all. It does focus on how the NSA is now spending a ton of time trying to figure out how to prevent future leaks, but that's to be expected. It also talks about how the NSA needs to focus on that rather than on spying on everyone with a hint of "and you might all die because we can't do our jobs" added in for flavor.

Another effect of Snowden's disclosures on NSA operations has been that agency leaders have chosen to expedite planned security reforms, as part of an effort to prevent future leaks. The agency has begun consolidating databases, moving them from separate repositories into large data centers where cloud analysis can be employed. The data are to be "tagged" with restrictions so that analysts not qualified or authorized to review the information will not be able to access it.

"We've had to do things that we had planned to do over the next three or four years and move them dramatically to the left," says the NSA's chief information officer, Lonny Anderson. "We haven't asked for additional resources. We've just said, 'We've got to do this.' So something gives, because we're not getting additional resources. And what gives, for us, is mission."

The NSA mission is intelligence gathering.

"We have to make sure we don't cross a line where we're so busy locking down the networks that we're not defending the nation," Anderson says. "That's the fine line we walk."

Of course, that's silly. If part of what Snowden revealed was the terrible data management and security of the NSA, then that seems worth fixing anyway. In fact, it could be argued that the failure to properly control the NSA's data was likely a much bigger threat than anything Snowden leaked.

NSA folks in the article also complain that the bad guys might use other forms of communication, but they've been saying that all along, and that's a silly complaint. As noted, most actual terrorists were already pretty aware of what technologies to avoid.

What the article really means by its title is that the NSA itself hasn't had a mass-epiphany that it should change its ways. But I don't think anyone ever believed that would happen, let alone Snowden. The effect that Snowden appears to have wanted was to have the public more aware of what the NSA was doing, hopefully leading to policy makers in Congress to fix the problems that have allowed the NSA to have gone so far overboard with its surveillance efforts. And that debate is happening, and considering how many bills have been introduced to reform the surveillance state, it appears that the debate is having an impact. How big an impact remains to be seen, but to argue that it's not having the effect he wanted is just wrong.

Filed Under: ed snowden, fud, nsa, nsa surveillance

NSA Overreach May Have Contributed To UK's Unwillingness To Help With Syria

from the comes-back-to-hurt dept

As you may have heard, UK Prime Minister David Cameron dealt with something of an embarrassment when the UK Parliament voted down his Syria policy this week. There are a number of reasons why this likely happened, but an editorial in the Guardian notes that the latest NSA surveillance revelations may have had something to do with it:

There is no evidence that British public opinion has turned isolationist. There is plenty of evidence that it is fed up with the debilitating post 9/11 years of national sacrifice, with the humiliating excesses of US national security policy (not least its abuses of human rights and surveillance), with the unequal burden-sharing among allies and, above all, with the failures of policy.

Yes, there are a variety of issues buried in there, but key among them is the "excesses" of the US' "national security policy" complete with excess surveillance. We've been pointing out for a while that these revelations could have wider impact and reverberate much further than US officials seem willing to admit, but this may be a small sign of that in action.

Filed Under: david cameron, fed up, fud, national security, nsa, nsa surveillance, overhype, overreach, syria, uk

US Military Admits No One Died Because Of Manning's Leaks

from the right,-so... dept

One of the key talking points against Bradley Manning was how his leaks "put people in danger" and we've even seen some of the defenders of his prosecution claim that people had lost lives because of them. In fact, Army Chief of Staff Mike Mullen had directly stated that Manning (and Wikileaks) "might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family." Guess what? That was all FUD. As Manning's sentencing hearing kicked off, a key government witness admitted that there were no deaths that were attributable to those leaks. That came straight from Brig. Gen. Robert Carr, who was in charge of the response to the leaks. Among other things, he also noted that since the names did not appear in Arabic, it was unlikely that our enemies would have figured out who they really were anyway.

The retired general added that some of these contacts could not be found, others had died before the WikiLeaks disclosures, and others had been insurgents rather than cooperators with coalition forces.

Carr acknowledged that none of the names of Iraqi and Afghan contacts appeared in the original Arabic.

To this point, Manning's military defenders, Maj. Thomas Hurley, asked: "We don't share an alphabet with either of those countries, do we, Sir?"

"No," Carr replied.

Hurley also prompted Carr to concede that Iraqi and Afghan nationals tend not to be "not as plugged in" as Westerners.

The report also notes that while, in the past, some have claimed that an Afghani man killed by the Taliban was a result of those leaks "the supposed informant the Taliban claimed to have executed was not in fact named in the leaked materials." In other words, all the talk of people dying because of his leaks? Not true. Yet why do we trust the government every time there's a leak when they insist that everyone's lives are at risk?

Filed Under: bradley manning, deaths, fud, impact, robert carr, wikileaks

Dick Cheney's Crystal Ball Says That NSA Surveillance Could Have Stopped 9/11

from the but-not-the-boston-bombing dept

We already commented on FBI director Robert Mueller arguing that the NSA's mass surveillance techniques would have prevented 9/11, and now it appears that Dick Cheney is agreeing with this fictional scenario in which his crystal ball says what might have happened:

"As everybody who's been associated with the program's said, if we had had this before 9/11, when there were two terrorists in San Diego — two hijackers — had been able to use that program, that capability, against that target, we might well have been able to prevent 9/11," Cheney said on "Fox News Sunday."

That's speculation based on nothing, frankly. As has been widely covered, there were a number of reasons why the government failed to stop 9/11, just as there were plenty of reasons it failed to stop the Boston bombings back in April. The idea that this program would have stopped one (while it clearly missed the other) isn't particularly convincing.

Of course, none of that gets to the bigger question of whether or not it's worth it. In theory, we could stop all sorts of crimes by putting military personnel and equipment in the streets, with the power to invade any home and do a full search. But we don't allow that. Because that's a violation of our privacy. And, yes, the loss of life from a terrorist attack is tragic and horrifying -- but many more people are killed in car accidents, and we don't freak out about that and take away everyone's cars. Giving up our basic principles of freedom on the off chance it might possibly stop a terrorist attack (while still missing other terrorist attacks) doesn't really seem like living up to the basic ideals of this country.

Filed Under: 9/11, dick cheney, fud, nsa, nsa surveillance, terrorism

Whatever Happened To The Exaflood?

from the gone-baby-gone dept

If you remember, about five years ago, a bunch of astroturfing and front groups for the broadband companies started spreading this myth that the internet was facing a catastrophe known as the the exaflood, in which internet traffic would swamp capacity and the internet would sputter to a crawl. They talked about things like "brown outs" where so much traffic would make the internet difficult to navigate. Of course, it was all FUD and scare tactics to hide the real intent: to allow the telcos to put more tollbooths on the internet, to double charge some popular internet companies, and to generally try to avoid investing in basic infrastructure. Of course, it was easy to debunk those claims, but five years later, Broadband Reports takes a look at some of the latest data to note that the feared exaflood never showed up, and the predictions of clogged pipes never appeared -- and the data on internet growth shows little likelihood of that ever happening.

Cisco's latest numbers are an ever further cry from what telecom sector lobbyists and think tankers were predicting in 2010 and before, when they were using a looming "exaflood" to scare regulators and the press and public into buying into bad telecom policy. Companies like Nemertes Research and The Discovery Institute (the latter a PR firm paid directly by carriers, the former long accused of having a rather cozy relationship with AT&T) insisted we'd be seeing Internet "brown outs" by this point courtesy of unsustainable growth rates of up to 100% or more.

The scary predictions were effective. Said lobbyists, think tankers, astroturfers and "fauxcademics" convinced many people that if the telecom industry wasn't given "X" (X being anything from fewer consumer protections and more subsidies to the right to bill by the byte or avoid network neutrality rules), that the Internet would collapse. That obviously never happened and intelligent engineers and networks adjusted, but few of the people who massaged data for their own financial ends over the last five to eight years were ever really held accountable.

Of course, there's always more fear and FUD to go around, so expect plenty more stories about looming problems if we don't give the big broadband guys whatever anti-competitive thing that they want going forward...

Filed Under: broadband, exaflood, fud, hype, telcos

In Defense Of Digital Freedom: It's Time To Get Beyond 'Cyber' Hyperbole

from the speak-up dept

Marietje Schaake, a member of the European Parliament often credited as one of the most tech savvy (and, yes, a regular Techdirt reader) has penned an excellent article, In defense of digital freedom. It's well worth a read, even if it covers many things that regular readers of the site will be familiar with. The key point it makes, however, is that we shouldn't be frightened by all the "cyberwar" FUD out there, which is designed to get us to give up our ideals on internet freedom. It discusses how much hype there is around "cyber" everything, nearly all of it trying to scare people. She admits that there are real threats, but those driving the discussion seem to have little interest in parsing them out from the hype and bluster. She notes that, in this rush for new laws, we seem to ignore that existing infrastructure can actually handle most of the actual problems.

The good news is that we don’t need ‘cyber democracy’ to guarantee ‘cyber security’. In most cases the foundations for resilience are already in our existing laws and regulations. Technologies are an essential part of our daily lives, businesses, education, cultural experiences and political engagement. As a result, resilience and defense need to be integrated and mainstreamed to strengthen both freedom and security.

[....] To prevent fear, hype and incident-driven policies and practices, knowledge, transparency and accountability are needed. Let us not make ‘cyber’ into something completely different, alien or spacy. But rather, let us focus on integrating technological developments in a way that allows us to preserve core (constitutional) principles, democratic oversight, and digital freedoms as essentials in our open societies.

She also notes that much of the hype may be driven by companies and politicians who benefit from such hype, driving new business to companies and passing new laws that give politicians more power. But, she notes, if we make policy based on those two drivers, internet freedom will certainly be put at risk. The unintended consequences are pretty clear:

US government has stated that American made, lawful intercept technologies, have come back as a boomerang when they were used against US interests by actors in third countries.

Other companies, such as Area Spa from Italy designed a monitoring centre, and had people on the ground in Syria helping the Assad government succeed in anti-democratic or even criminal behaviour by helping the crackdown against peaceful dissidents and demonstrators.

One key point she makes is that we need to have a fact-based, careful look at the issues, in which we avoid conflating very, very different things (i.e., random hacking with "war").

To avoid a slippery slope, clear distinctions between various crimes and threats are needed. Economic damage as a result of criminal activity should render a different response than a state-led attack posing national security threats. Yet, at the moment, at least in the public debate, the distinction between various cyber threats is very unclear. Uncertainly can make people feel vulnerable, while it is internet users and citizens that need to be informed and empowered. We need to build resilient and educated societies instead of installing fear.

States also need to prioritise in their partnerships, and look for consistency of actions by different government departments. Recently, the United States chose to sign a bilateral agreement with Russia on combatting Intellectual Property Rights infringements. The agreed cooperation seems in direct contradiction with objectives of the State Department in the field of internet freedom. In Russia, a newly adopted law gives the state the authority to use Deep Packet Inspections in internet traffic.

There's a lot more in the piece as well, and I think many of our readers will find it quite interesting. It's always nice to know that there are some elected officials in the world are trying to base key policy decisions, including those around internet freedom, on reality rather than fear and hype.

Filed Under: cybersecurity, eu parliament, free speech, fud, hacking, internet freedom, marietje schaake

TIME/CNN Poll Shows Increasing Number Of Americans Won't Give Up Civil Liberties To Fight Terrorism

from the the-government-can't-give-you-safety,-but-it-can-take-your-rights dept

When discussing NYPD Police Chief Ray Kelly's assertion that "privacy is off the table" as a result of the Boston bombing, I mentioned I hadn't heard any public outcry demanding the government and law enforcement step in and do something (i.e., curtail civil liberties) in response to the tragedy. The responses we were seeing seemed to be nothing more than legislators and law enforcement officials pushing their own agendas.

This isn't just me not hearing what I don't want to hear. There's actual data available that explains the lack of concerned noises from Americans. A CNN/TIME poll shows that nearly two-thirds of Americans aren't interested in sacrificing rights to combat terrorism.

When given a choice, 61 percent of Americans say they are more concerned about the government enacting new anti-terrorism policies that restrict civil liberties, compared to 31 percent who say they are more concerned about the government failing to enact strong new anti-terrorism policies.

This is a vast improvement over 1996, when a post-Atlanta Olympics bombing poll showed only 23% opposed giving up freedom in exchange for fighting terrorism.

Breaking it down further, the poll also shows a bit of split along party lines. Self-identified Democrats are most likely to put their faith in government/law enforcement to make the U.S. "safer" by curtailing freedoms (51%). Republicans are less likely to favor this exchange (41%). For independents, less than a third (32%) are willing to give up some freedom to combat terrorism.

There is a bit of bad news contained within this generally positive indicator that Americans are less willing to give up something of theirs in exchange for the vagaries of "safety." The percentage of respondents who support additional surveillance in public areas has increased to 81% from 63% the week after the 9/11 attacks. On the other hand, there's a growing reluctance among Americans to allow the government to expand its surveillance efforts to cover more private venues, like email or cell phones. Only 38% approve of these efforts, down from 54% after 9/11.

Now, when legislators and law enforcement reps make strides towards reducing civil liberties, they do have some support. Those over the age of 50 (across all political parties) are most likely to support a loss of freedom (50%, as compared to only 34% for those under 50). Tellingly, this is pretty much the same demographic that feels video games are a bigger "safety threat" than guns (72% of respondents over the age of 45).

Unfortunately for the under-50 crowd, the over-50 demographic is historially the most active at the polls. If this perception of widespread support for invasive policies and legislation is going to change, the under-50 demographic is going to need to do a whole lot more voting. If not, these politicians are going to be able to truthfully say they have support for these policies -- at least, the only support that matters: die-hard voters.

Filed Under: civil liberties, fear, fud, terrorism, the public