Evelyn Farkas' body language when she tries to walk back her spying claims is amazing...

This comment from reddit sums it up well.

Comment from discussion Evelyn Farkas' body language analyzed and it is damning..

Here is the video.

UN trying to decide how to respond to AT&T helping NSA spy on them...

Move. Please move...

Via Reuters

The United Nations said it expects member states to respect its right to privacy and is assessing how to respond to a report that telecommunications company AT&T Inc helped the U.S. National Security Agency spy on the world body’s communications.
The company gave technical assistance to the NSA in carrying out a secret court order allowing wiretapping of all Internet communications at the headquarters of the United Nations, an AT&T customer, the New York Times reported on Saturday.
The New York Times cited newly disclosed NSA documents that date from 2003 to 2013 and were provided by fugitive former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.
“We obviously have security and safety measures in place including through … our information and technology department. We are looking at this and how best to respond,” U.N. spokeswoman Vannina Maestracci told reporters.
“The United States authorities had previously given us assurances as to the fact they are not and were not monitoring our communications,” she said.

Interesting: NSA officials had the same concerns Snowden did about their collecting all your phone records...

The White House decided to do it anyway.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Dissenters within the National Security Agency, led by a senior agency executive, warned in 2009 that the program to secretly collect American phone records wasn't providing enough intelligence to justify the backlash it would cause if revealed, current and former intelligence officials say.

The NSA took the concerns seriously, and many senior officials shared them. But after an internal debate that has not been previously reported, NSA leaders, White House officials and key lawmakers opted to continue the collection and storage of American calling records, a domestic surveillance program without parallel in the agency's recent history.

The warnings proved prophetic last year after the calling records program was made public in the first and most significant leak by Edward Snowden, a former NSA systems administrator who cited the government's deception about the program as one of his chief motivations for turning over classified documents to journalists. Many Americans were shocked and dismayed to learn that an intelligence agency collects and stores all their landline calling records. Keep on reading...

Sharyl Attkisson Posts Video Of Her Computer Deleting Her Files Without Her Aid

I can't prove it, but the Obama administration is behind this. 

Interesting: Apple's new encryption will prevent them from turning over user device data even if police have a warrant...

Our governments abuse of our privacy rights is backfiring on them. 

Via WaPo:

Apple said Wednesday night that it is making it impossible for the company to turn over data from most iPhones or iPads to police — even when they have a search warrant — taking a hard new line as tech companies attempt to blunt allegations that they have too readily participated in government efforts to collect user information.
The move, announced with the publication of a new privacy policy tied to the release of Apple’s latest mobile operating system, iOS 8, amounts to an engineering solution to a legal quandary: Rather than comply with binding court orders, Apple has reworked its latest encryption in a way that prevents the company — or anyone but the device’s owner — from gaining access to the vast troves of user data typically stored on smartphones or tablet computers.
The key is the encryption that Apple mobile devices automatically put in place when a user selects a passcode, making it difficult for anyone who lacks that passcode to access the information within, including photos, e-mails and recordings. Apple once maintained the ability to unlock some content on devices for legally binding police requests but will no longer do so for iOS 8, it said in the new privacy policy.

Sad: Obama's privacy board doesn't think you deserve much privacy...

I guess we should consider who appointed them...

Via Ars Technica: 

A White House panel examining the privacy and legal fallout from the massive National Security Agency spying revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden concluded that the snooping was lawful yet "close to the line of constitutional reasonableness."
The Privacy and Civil Liberties Board said that the programs that tap undersea cables and acquire data from ISPs like Yahoo and Google with broad orders from a secret court are "authorized by Congress, reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, and an extremely valuable and effective intelligence tool."
The 191-page report (PDF), released late Tuesday, was largely condemned by civil liberties advocates and scholars.
"Sadly, the board has failed to fulfill its responsibility here, which is to ensure that counterterrorism policies safeguard privacy and civil liberties,” Elizabeth Goitein, a director of the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice. “The collection of Americans’ phone calls and e-mails without a warrant is unconstitutional, regardless of whether they are communicating with their next-door neighbor or a suspected terrorist overseas. The board, however, endorsed a ‘foreign intelligence exception’ to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement that is far broader than what any regular federal court has ever recognized. The board's recommendations would leave in place the government’s ability to spy on its citizens—along with their friends, family members, and business partners overseas—without any suspicion of wrongdoing.”

191 pages and no privacy for you.

Unlikely: Iran accuses Israel of using demons to spy on them...

Seriously?

Via AlaExpress:

An Iranian cleric accused Israel of using demons called “jinn” to spy on Iran and it’s allies. Iranian television broadcast a video where Waliullah Naqi Borfer, who claims to be an expert in the world of monsters such as Djins, a supernatural phenomenon of Arab mythology says that Jews have long experience in handling the jinn.
He added that Israel has tried to use the creature to spy on Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas. But still he thought Israelis failed in their attempts. He did not give details of this failure.

Good News: The NSA may be storing your picture...

It not about catching terrorists, it's about control and it's dangerous in the wrong hands.

Via The New York Times:

The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents.

The spy agency’s reliance on facial recognition technology has grown significantly over the last four years as the agency has turned to new software to exploit the flood of images included in emails, text messages, social media, videoconferences and other communications, the N.S.A. documents reveal. Agency officials believe that technological advances could revolutionize the way that the N.S.A. finds intelligence targets around the world, the documents show. The agency’s ambitions for this highly sensitive ability and the scale of its effort have not previously been disclosed.

The agency intercepts “millions of images per day” — including about 55,000 “facial recognition quality images” — which translate into “tremendous untapped potential,” according to 2011 documents obtained from the former agency contractor Edward J. Snowden. While once focused on written and oral communications, the N.S.A. now considers facial images, fingerprints and other identifiers just as important to its mission of tracking suspected terrorists and other intelligence targets, the documents show.

NSA spied on lawyers representing foreign countries in economic disputes...

NSA spying isn't about al Qaeda. It's about government control.  

Via The NYT:

The list of those caught up in the global surveillance net cast by the National Security Agency and its overseas partners, from social media users to foreign heads of state, now includes another entry: American lawyers.
A top-secret document, obtained by the former N.S.A. contractor Edward J. Snowden, shows that an American law firm was monitored while representing a foreign government in trade disputes with the United States. The disclosure offers a rare glimpse of a specific instance in which Americans were ensnared by the eavesdroppers, and is of particular interest because lawyers in the United States with clients overseas have expressed growing concern that their confidential communications could be compromised by such surveillance.
The government of Indonesia had retained the law firm for help in trade talks, according to the February 2013 document. It reports that the N.S.A.’s Australian counterpart, the Australian Signals Directorate, notified the agency that it was conducting surveillance of the talks, including communications between Indonesian officials and the American law firm, and offered to share the information.

Obama's NSA is using your smartphone apps to spy on you...

Is it time to just dump our smartphones?

Via The Guardian: 

The National Security Agency and its UK counterpart GCHQ have been developing capabilities to take advantage of "leaky" smartphone apps, such as the wildly popular Angry Birds game, that transmit users' private information across the internet, according to top secret documents.
The data pouring onto communication networks from the new generation of iPhone and Android apps ranges from phone model and screen size to personal details such as age, gender and location. Some apps, the documents state, can share users' most sensitive information such as sexual orientation – and one app recorded in the material even sends specific sexual preferences such as whether or not the user may be a swinger.

NSA infiltrates online gaming...

Your privacy isn't safe anywhere anymore...

To the National Security Agency analyst writing a briefing to his superiors, the situation was clear: their current surveillance efforts were lacking something. The agency's impressive arsenal of cable taps and sophisticated hacking attacks was not enough. What it really needed was a horde of undercover Orcs.
That vision of spycraft sparked a concerted drive by the NSA and its UK sister agency GCHQ to infiltrate the massive communities playing online games, according to secret documents disclosed by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
The files were obtained by the Guardian and are being published on Monday in partnership with the New York Times and ProPublica.
The agencies, the documents show, have built mass-collection capabilities against the Xbox Live console network, which has more than 48 million players. Real-life agents have been deployed into virtual realms, from those Orc hordes in World of Warcraft to the human avatars of Second Life. There were attempts, too, to recruit potential informants from the games' tech-friendly users.

Shocking: Obama's NSA tracking 5 billion people's cellphone location daily...

Can you imagine the liberal outrage if Bush were President?

Via The Guardian: 

The National Security Agency is reportedly collecting almost 5 billion cell phone records a day under a program that monitors and analyses highly personal data about the precise whereabouts of individuals, wherever they travel in the world.
Details of the giant database of location-tracking information, and the sophisticated ways in which the NSA uses the data to establish relationships between people, have been revealed by the Washington Post, which cited documents supplied by whistleblower Edward Snowden and intelligence officials.
The spy agency is said to be tracking the movements of “at least hundreds of millions of devices” in what amounts to a staggeringly powerful surveillance tool. It means the NSA can, through mobile phones, track individuals anywhere they travel – including into private homes – or retrace previously traveled journeys.
The data can also be used to study patterns of behaviour to reveal personal information and relationships between different users.

Flashback Video: Obama promises "No more Illegal Wire Tapping of American Citizens"

Heh.

Tweets of the Day: #handygate

In Germany, “Handy” refers to cell phone. “#Handygate” means cellphonegate.

#handygate. pic.twitter.com/ppF9Wf3gqi
— Ralf Fastner (@rfastner) October 26, 2013

Ozapft is! #merkelphone #handygate @BarackWatchingU pic.twitter.com/OcLK1bbgbY
— Timo Brückel (@timo_brueckel) October 27, 2013

Is it OK for the Obama administration to spy on our friends and allies?

According to this CS Monitor article, we spy because we can and we sometimes have competing interests with our allies.

As the scandal over the United States spying on friends and allies expands beyond German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cell phone to perhaps dozens of other countries, one question lingering in the background is: Why spy on friends anyway?
The basic answer, some national intelligence and security experts say, is that relations among countries are essentially based on interests, and no matter how friendly countries may be, their interests are rarely exactly the same.
“We and Germany don’t always see eye-to-eye on some important issues,” says James Lewis, director of the Technology and Public Policy Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “One way to reassure yourself about the direction an ally like Germany is heading on one of those issues is to know what Germany is saying.”

Is this OK? The short answer is no. The long answer is also no. Aside from the problems it causes when you get caught, it's unethical. Let's compare this to an ordinary citizen's situation. A man is getting a divorce and in an ugly custody and property battle with his wife. He suspects his wife is talking about the divorce with his best friend. Is it OK for him to tap his friends phone if he can? Not only would that be wrong, it would be a felony in the U.S. If the friend lived in a foreign country, it might not be a crime, but it would still be wrong. You don't spy on your best friends.

Brazil, Russia, India and China forming new Internet to avoid NSA spying...

Brazil, Russia, India and China forming new Internet to aid NSA spying. Do you blame them? Of course, Russia and China will be spying on the new Internet. 

BRICS countries are close to completing a brand new Internet backbone that would bypass the United States entirely and thereby protect both governments and citizens from NSA spying. [...]

Brazil is set to finalize a 34,000-kilometre undersea fiber-optic cable by 2015 that will run from Vladivostok, Russia to Fortaleza, Brazil, via Shantou, China, Chennai, India and Cape Town, South Africa.

According to the Hindu, the project will create, “a network free of US eavesdropping,” which via legislative mandates will also force the likes of Google, Facebook and Yahoo to store all data generated by BRICS nations locally, shielding it from NSA snooping.

“The BRICS countries have the muscle to pull this off,” notes Washington’s Blog. “Each of the BRICS countries are in the top 25 largest economies in the world. China has the world’s second largest economy, India is 3rd, Russia 6th, Brazil 7th, and South Africa 25th.

Scary: NSA Utah data center spying so much it melts down...

Don't let the government lie to you and tell you they aren't collecting all your phone, email and voice communications. They are and it takes a huge amount of power. 

Via GIZMODO:

This is embarrassingly funny. The WSJ reports that the NSA's new Utah data center has suffered 10 meltdowns in the past 13 months because of electrical surges. The NSA is basically using so much power in its spying efforts that it is poetically killing its data centers. Seriously, the surges have destroyed hundreds of thousands of dollars in machinery.

Revealed: NSA employees spy on their love interests...

The NSA identified 12 instances where this occurred. The is no way to know how many times it happened without their detection. This is likely just the tip of the iceberg. Nobody was even fired. One resigned, one retired (with full retirement pay?) and another was allegedly demoted. This is unacceptable. Using NSA resources to illegally spy on someone looks to me like a clear violation of federal wiretapping law? All these people should be in prison, if they are guilty.

Via The Hill:

The National Security Agency has admitted that analysts have abused their authority to spy on love interests on several occasions.
In response to a letter from Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the NSA identified 12 incidents since 2003 in which analysts intentionally misused their intelligence gathering powers.
In one case, an analyst spied on a foreign phone number she discovered in her husband's cellphone, suspecting that he had cheated on her. She intercepted phone calls involving her husband, investigators discovered. The analyst resigned before any disciplinary action could be taken.
On one analyst's first day of access to the NSA system, he pulled records on six email addresses belonging to his ex-girlfriend. He claimed he just wanted to test the system. The NSA demoted him and docked his pay for two months.

Declassified documents show NSA violated privacy rules on a massive scale. The NSA claims they were too stupid to understand their software...

Well, this really inspires confidence...

Via The Washington Post:

The National Security Agency for almost three years searched a massive database of Americans’ phone call records in violation of court-approved privacy rules, and the problem went unfixed because no one at the agency had a full technical understanding of how the system worked, according to new documents and senior government officials.

The improper activity went on from May 2006 to January 2009, according to a scathing March 2009 opinion by Judge Reggie B. Walton, a judge on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.[...]

In fact, only numbers in which analysts could prove there was “reasonable articulable suspicion” of a link to foreign terrorists could be queried against the database, according to court-approved rules.
 

Walton said NSA’s explanation for its violation of the court order — that some NSA personnel thought the querying rules applied only to archived data — “strains credulity.” He also expressed consternation at NSA’s inaccurate description of the process it was using to query the database.

Shameful: NSA employees spied on their lovers...

If you give someone that kind of access and power, someone will abuse it. This is why they should never have access to everyone's emails, phone calls and other electronic information. The NSA should have to get the records from providers on at a time after they get a court order.

Via The Telegraph:

Staff working at America's National Security Agency – the eavesdropping unit that was revealed to have spied on millions of people – have used the technology to spy on their lovers.

The employees even had a code name for the practice – "Love-int" – meaning the gathering of intelligence on their partners.

Dianne Feinstein, a senator who chairs the Senate intelligence committee, said the NSA told her committee about a set of "isolated cases" that have occurred about once a year for the last 10 years. The spying was not within the US, and was carried out when one of the lovers was abroad.

One employee was disciplined for using the NSA's resources to track a former spouse, the Associated Press said.

Don't be surprised when it is later revealed that someone has used their ability to spy for political purposes. Note: Notice they said one employee was disciplined. The term "disciplined" usually doesn't mean fired. I guess the rest who did it, weren't punished at all.