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

Congress Eagerly Leaked Classified Information To Try To Discredit Snowden For Leaking Classified Information

from the snake-eats-itself dept

It's been two years since the very first news report in the Guardian based on documents provided by Ed Snowden. The NY Times (and other newspapers around the globe in varying languages) has published an op-ed by Snowden himself that gives a nice summary of how much has happened in the past two years, with real pushback finally starting to appear. As Snowden says:

The balance of power is beginning to shift. We are witnessing the emergence of a post-terror generation, one that rejects a worldview defined by a singular tragedy. For the first time since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, we see the outline of a politics that turns away from reaction and fear in favor of resilience and reason. With each court victory, with every change in the law, we demonstrate facts are more convincing than fear. As a society, we rediscover that the value of a right is not in what it hides, but in what it protects.

And yet, on the same day, Jason Leopold has also published details of how Congress regularly leaked classified information in an effort to demonize Snowden and to make it look like his actions caused harm -- something they still cannot show.

As you may recall, late in 2013, a talking point emerged that Snowden had made off with 1.7 million documents -- many of which included military secrets. The number had changed a bunch. The first claim was 60,000 documents. Then 200,000. When 60 Minutes did an NSA puff piece in December of that year it had ballooned to 1.5 million documents. A few days later, politicians seemed to settle on 1.7 million documents -- even as Glenn Greenwald (who actually had the documents) pointed out that it wasn't even close to true.

As we, and many others, pointed out around then, the 1.7 million claim appeared to come based on faulty assumptions, with the big one being that he copied every document from every network he ever scanned. A few months later, after all the fuss died down, James Clapper finally admitted that the 1.7 million number was hogwash -- but, by then, most of the press had moved on.

As Leopold's reporting has turned up, however, Congressional Snowden-haters were really, really eager to use this claim of 1.7 million documents to "shift the story" on Snowden. They had received that number as a talking point in a DIA briefing and wanted to make use of it:

"Members from both sides (Reps. Richard Nugent, Austin Scott, Henry "Hank" Johnson, Jr. and Susan Davis) repeatedly pressed the [DIA] briefers for information from the [Snowden damage] report to be made releasable to the public," states a February 6, 2014 DIA summary prepared for then-DIA director Lieutenant General Michael Flynn and deputy director David Shedd about a briefing on the Snowden leaks for members of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities.

"[Redacted] explained the restrictions were to [redacted] but the members appeared unmoved by this argument. Overall, HASC [House Armed Services Committee] members were both appreciative of the report and expressed repeatedly that this information needed to be shared with the American public."

Of course, that didn't stop Congress critters from leaking the data anyway:

On December 18, the Washington Post's Walter Pincus published a column, citing anonymous sources, that contained details from the Snowden damage assessment. Three days earlier, 60 Minutes had broadcast a report that was widely condemned as overly sympathetic to the NSA. Foreign Policy and Bloomberg published news stories on January 9, 2014, three days after the damage assessment report was turned over to six congressional oversight committees. Both of those reports quoted a statement from Republican congressional leaders who cited the DIA's classified damage assessment report and asserted that Snowden's leaks endangered the lives of US military personnel.

Most of those came before the DIA released the number as an unclassified "talking point."

And the documents also reveal that Congress seemed pretty focused on figuring out ways to "change the narrative" on Snowden, rather than actually assessing what Snowden took -- and, apparently felt they could decide on their own which information in the briefing was classified and what was unclassified, so long as it served their own narrative:

During one classified briefing the damage assessment task force officials held for members of the House Intelligence Committee on Intelligence, lawmakers asked why Snowden, "who claims publicly to be seeking to reform NSA… acquired so many DoD files unrelated to NSA activities."

"[Redacted] explained that [Snowden] appeared to have acquired all files he could reach" was the answer. House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Rogers and Congressman Adam Schiff "raised the issue that most documents were DoD related — which [redacted] confirmed — and both the congressmen stated they believed this simple fact was both unclassified… and was important for changing the narrative" about Snowden, states an undated summary of the House Intelligence Committee briefing the DIA prepared for Flynn and Shedd.

And, thus, it appears many in Congress had no problem potentially leaking classified information to attack Snowden as a "traitor" for leaking classified information, even though the claims about what he leaked were not, in fact, true.

Filed Under: classified information, congress, damage assessment, dia, ed snowden, leaks

Here's 140 Fully-Redacted Pages Explaining How Much Snowden's Leaks Have Harmed The Nation's Security

from the FOIA:-Freedom-Of-Ink-Act dept

If the US intelligence committee is concerned about the status of "hearts and minds" in its ongoing NSA v. Snowden battle, it won't be winning anyone over with its latest response to a FOIA request.

Various representatives of the intelligence community have asserted (sometimes repeatedly) that Snowden's leaks have caused irreparable harm to intelligence-gathering efforts and placed the nation in "grave danger." But when given the chance to show the public how much damage has been done, it declares everything on the subject too sensitive to release. EVERYTHING.

Here's the Defense Intelligence Agency's appraisal of the current situation, as released to Vice News' Jason Leopold.

On the subject of compromised information:

How about intelligence sharing and cooperation?


At least we know that -- as of January 2014 -- there were four (4) "talking points."


Every single assessment, dating back to September 2013, is fully redacted. How does that help communicate the DIA's concerns about Snowden's leaks to the general public? How does that persuade anyone about the alleged severity of the situation?

From what's not on display here, it's safe to say the general public's perception of the American intelligence apparatus doesn't matter. Those who do matter are those already on the NSA's side, and then only those with the power to guide legislation towards favorable ends. It's safe to say that there are people in Washington DC who have seen at least a portion of these reports, but that small group contains no members of the general public.

A fully-redacted report may seem logical in the eyes of the intelligence community, which despite multiple leakers, still pretends its secrets will always be secret. Page after page of redaction shows it's really not interested in the transparency it keeps promising will make everything better. It doesn't want to give the public any more information than it already has and this mess of whiteout and black ink clearly and loudly states that it believes the public has no stake in the ongoing debate over mass surveillance.

It's a wordless insult, delivered under the pretense of "national security."

Filed Under: damage, damage assessment, defense intelligence agency, dia, doj, ed snowden, foia, nsa, surveillance