NSA Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets (nytimes.com) 48
The NSA is stopping one of the most disputed forms of its warrantless surveillance program (alternative source), one in which it collects Americans' emails and texts to and from people overseas and that mention a foreigner under surveillance, NYTimes reports on Friday citing officials familiar with the matter. From the report: National security officials have argued that such surveillance is lawful and helpful in identifying people who might have links to terrorism, espionage or otherwise are targeted for intelligence-gathering. The fact that the sender of such a message would know an email address or phone number associated with a surveillance target is grounds for suspicion, these officials argued. [...] The N.S.A. made the change to resolve problems it was having complying with special rules imposed by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in 2011 to protect Americans' privacy. For technical reasons, the agency ended up collecting messages sent and received domestically as a byproduct of such surveillance, the officials said.
But... (Score:2)
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Include the date this program started...1945. Truth is it started earlier, but was formalized after the end of WWII.
I first heard rumors of the phone metadata database in the mid 1980s. At the time it was accepted, by those considered paranoid at the time, that the NSA had mapped relationships to the extent they knew anybody you had _ever_ repeatedly called on the phone. Granting it was noisy data at the time, phones to people not being as one to one as they are today.
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... and better hidden. The NSA does not think its immoral acts were the problem, it thinks getting caught was the problem. They are, as so many people, completely unaware of history.
Right (Score:1)
And considering that they were copying this shit for YEARS before they were "found out", what's the likelihood that they're "really" going to stop?
Thank you President Trump (Score:1)
Doing what Obama couldn't (or wouldn't)
Self interest (Score:2)
Trump obviously doesn't care about an American's emails being read unless the American is him or one of his employees. While I may like the result in this case, I seriously doubt he'd be implementing this policy if it didn't benefit himself.
Sure, they did. (Score:5, Funny)
I believe them 100% because they've never lied to the public before. Or the courts. Or Congress. Why wouldn't you take them at their word?
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I believe them. I believe that they will stop collecting and archiving these emails.
I don't for a moment believe that they wont:
a) continue scanning everything you do
b) have ISPs and Telecom companies hold the emails *ahem* metadata for years to come
c) continue the process of sending NSA letters with no oversight to targets who have no say in their privacy.
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Of course I believe them because I can see exactly what they are doing. They will pay private corporations for that data, giving those private corporations and incentive to collect all digital data and store all digital communications because low and behold they can sell it to the government, whilst the government claims it is not doing it, nuh uh. The arse holes are just making it legal for private corporations to do it, lead by M$ and Windows anal probe 10 and now the ISPs (Invasive Sellers of Privacy) an
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its funny how that works when its the people in power whose emails are caught this way and all of a sudden they too agree with Snowden. so maybe they do mean it this time.
Collecting all those redundant emails had to cost (Score:2)
Why should the NSA collect a second copy?
The copy they collected from all American's email should be sufficient.
Only collecting .... (Score:2)
We don't believe you (Score:3, Insightful)
Keep dreaming (Score:3)
Laws and policies will not stop erosion of privacy by government or big business. Why? Because they really aren't accountable to anyone, and whistle-blowers get into severe trouble.
If something CAN be done, then it is likely it WILL be done... especially if it one or more of these:
* Cheap
* Easy
* Important to them
* Has precedence
* Already being collected
It is like a microphone in a device- The way to ensure privacy isn't to list all kinds of rules and laws and disclosures, it is to put a hard switch on it so the user has the option to turn it off.
Freedom and privacy shouldn't be exclusively to trying to limit what we DO with the information once it is collected. The only real way to ensure you are not being tracked is to prevent the collection of information in the first place. The only sure way to know a license plate scanner isn't being used improperly is to not use them, or limit the scope of how they are used. The only way to know cameras aren't tracking you is to not have cameras everywhere. The only way to know people can't potentionally abuse your messaging is to have encryption that can't be broken and without back-doors.
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>"Also, a constitution should not be viewed as only negative, that is limiting, but also a positive law. This relates to the regulation and legislation the government should make to ensure the constitutional protections of the citizens are upheld and realized even in the contexts of the private. But that's the horrible European socialism you can't possibly have."
Indeed we are not European. The Constitution of the United States of America limits the powers of government; that it its sole purpose. All ri
Trump (Score:5, Interesting)
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While I don't believe for a second that the NSA is going to stop collecting ANYTHING, if it does happen to be true I really don't care WHAT motivation is behind innocent citizens being spied on less, as long as innocent citizens are spied on less.
aside from typical remarks I have one insight here (Score:2)
...if you have a government service that has so much eroded public support and trust to the point that no one believes anything they say about their own policies (even the potus)....then it might be time to restructure or close shop and start from scratch. There is some poison in that establishment that is going to take a wrecking ball to correct I think....
If it was so valuable to them, why was it hard to come up with some form of metric to prove its worth?
we used to, BUT WE DON"T anymore (Score:3, Informative)
WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE! (Score:2)