Government likely to open criminal probe into NSA leaks

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/08/us-usa-security-leaks-idUSBRE95700C20130608

by teawithcarl • 13 years ago

247 103 13 years ago

mpyne12• 13 years ago

I didn't know the WaPo story had been authored by someone working with Assange to make a documentary on WikiLeaks. That would at least explain why "data directly from" was misinterpreted to mean "backdoor direct access" since I doubt she had the training to disambiguate the terms used.

Not that it matters too much anyways, I'm assuming it wasn't an OpEd and therefore she'd still have received the normal editing and source-checking services. But I do wonder if there is any reporting that was done by those who don't hold quite as much of a bias as Poitras and Greenwald, for the same reason I would be suspicious of a history of the Iraq invasion authored by Rumsfeld...

danso• 13 years ago

The Washington Post story was double-bylined (and also credited several other reporters and researchers), and the lead byline went to Barton Gellman, who used to be full-time at the WP but (AFAIK) is at TIME magazine. Not sure what the publishing process for this story was about (it seems unusual to have a story lead-bylined by only non-staff members), but I imagine it had something to do with the Guardian dropping their bombshells and the WP deciding that it also should publish (perhaps this story had been in the works, but wasn't originally going to be published this week).

disclosure: I know Gellman as an acquaintance through a colleague and consider him to be a great reporter...but I'd probably say that anyway just based on him wining the Pulitzer for his reporting on Dick Cheney (http://www.pulitzer.org/citation/2008-National-Reporting)

eli2• 13 years ago

It's not yet clear that anything in the original piece is actually wrong, despite some carefully worded denials. I think it's unfair to judge him as misinterpreting something (yet).

mpyne12• 13 years ago

As best as I can tell Greenwald was claiming that the NSA managed to backdoor most major Internet PIM service providers for the unbelievably low cost of $20 million.

You couldn't really do that for $20 million just on labor cost alone, so it was clear there was more to the story, it was just a question of what.

To be clear the story is important enough that I don't think it should be required to overstate or mislead either. Transparency of data collection and intelligence services is a conversation that America should at least have, whether it's backdoors or not.

grey-area2• 13 years ago

There are many reporters working on this, not just Greenwald or Poitras. The most recently released slide directly contradicts the statements by Google and Facebook:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/08/nsa-prism-server...

Given that they used the same phrases in their denials, it would seem they have been fed talking points, and are are using a novel interpretation of direct access. For example if Google or FB interpret a real-time mirror as 'not direct access', their statements are technically true, while at the same time being misleading. Doubtless the truth will come to light eventually, but for now we'll have to wait for more information and denials.

mpyne12• 13 years ago

It's not really a "novel interpretation" of direct access if all access to a company's servers have to go through the company. That's a subpoena-on-steroids and not much more, and this additional slide which the Guardian was so kind as to decide to provide to the masses doesn't really dispute that interpretation.

ig12• 13 years ago

No, if anything it supports the Google/FB interpretation.

From this slide it appears the distinction between the two types of data collection are between "indirect" on-the-wire intercepts and "direct" where the data's obtained from the company holding it. Given the context it could be referring to FISA obtained documents.

mtgx3• 13 years ago

So which is it? Is he "welcoming a debate over spying on Americans" or is he prosecuting the whistleblowers (again) and requesting state privileges to protect themselves against further scrutiny? I don't think the two can really co-exist. And if all of this was "already known" what's there to prosecute then? The amount of double-speak from the Obama administration astonishes me.

mayneack• 13 years ago

What's the point of classified information if you don't punish those that leak it?

Don't get me wrong, the treatment of Bradley Manning is absurd, and there shouldn't be any sort of prosecution of the journalists involved (which has been happening recently), so it's fair to complain that they are coming down too hard on whistle-blowers. However, you have to expect some sort of investigation into who did the original leaks.

We can also have the debate about whether they overly classify things and should be more open in the first place, but that's not the same thing.

kingraoul3• 13 years ago

We can't have that debate if we aren't informed about what's being kept from us.

kunai2• 13 years ago

We can also have the debate ... but that's not the same thing

Yes, it is. The whole thing is cohesive. Penetration at the source is the only thing that will halt government secrecy, and condemning those who leak classified information is egregious and a grave disservice to those people.

Classified information should only pertain to anything with national security at stake. The in-country data mining obviously did not.

mtgx3• 13 years ago

So the whistleblower law is just a "pretend-law"? Whistleblowers are needed for a healthy democracy, unless we have a pretend-democracy at this point, too. How do you uncover dirt on the government if every single act of whistleblowing and investigative journalism on the government is being prosecuted? Not only does that create a very chilling effect, but it also takes out everyone who did it, "before they cause too much damage". And doesn't this begin to resemble a little too much with some of those oppressive regimes?

The government classifies everything it doesn't want the public to know these days, and then tries to arrest everyone who leaks those documents. I think we need to stop thinking about what's legal and what's illegal, and start thinking about what moral and immoral. Many of these laws are immoral.

jivatmanx3• 13 years ago

The process of classifying material is uncontroversial because in general parlance, we assume that material is specific intelligence of people, place, and times.

The extension of that definition to include classified courts with classified rulings used as the legal basis for programs like this... is not the generally accepted one.

lifeguard• 13 years ago

As wikileaks has shown the government tends to classify EVERYTHING.

staunch• 13 years ago

I have trouble deciding whether people intentional misunderstand him, simple can't, or just prefer to be outraged.

The program is classified. Its more effective if it remains so. Since it is now public, though he wishes it wasn't, he's happy and willing to publicly debate the issue of privacy vs security. He's made it quite clear that he struggles with the issue himself.

Leaking classified information is illegal, thus it generally should be prosecuted. Though we also have whistleblower laws that protect people who are leaking evidence of criminal conduct.

ohazi• 13 years ago

We're in the midst of several legal cases that are trying to argue that the NSA spying program is criminal conduct.

_bfhp6• 13 years ago

That this doublespeak surprises anyone shows the tragedy of the small size of Glenn Greenwald's readership. He has been writing on Obama's abuses and misdirection since Obama admin has been in power; and before that, he's written about Bush's (published three books about Bush, in fact)

cenhyperion2• 13 years ago

I've pretty much come to the conclusion that he does the direct opposite of whatever he promises. He promised to end all this when he was elected, yet expanded on what Bush had started.

rhizome3• 13 years ago

I have had to consider the possibility that the military has gone rogue and it's not his decision to make.

onecommentonly• 13 years ago

Expected, unless the leaked doc said "ignore court order" or "kill the Presi..." leaking is illegal.

The person that leaked this knew that he /she would be prosecuted, if... Let's hope that he took care not to leave any crumbs as he gave the info to the Guardian

eli2• 13 years ago

The author of the original WaPo story said yesterday that the source was expecting to be caught. "I don't even think [the source] wants to stay masked forever."

Good interview if this is a story you care about.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/video/thefold/nsa-leak-source-...

philwelch7• 13 years ago

It's incredible how the presence of the word "leaks" turns the whole headline from promising to sinister. Why can't they investigate the NSA for once? Isn't that what a democratic country would do?

kunai2• 13 years ago

Isn't that what a democratic country would do

An informed democratic country, yes. But people in the United States are misled, misguided, and taught not to question government.

I know this from personal experience. My parents taught me to be afraid of government. Many of my friends were also taught the same thing. Everywhere I go, everyone in my age group either worships the government or fears it.

There is absolutely no democratic attitude here; it's frightening and totalitarian.

claudius• 13 years ago

It appears this was justified by a specific law that was passed by the representatives of the people for the people, so why should they investigate the NSA, especially in a democratic country?

AnthonyMouse• 13 years ago

Are you saying they should investigate Congress instead?

(I noticed that nobody has specified who the "they" is. In a democracy, maybe the "they" is supposed to be "us"?)

philwelch7• 13 years ago

Well, representatives of the gerrymanders for the gerrymanders.

yekko• 13 years ago

US justice system in ‘calamitous’ collapse

beachstartup• 13 years ago

anyone else notice there's been none of the usual China-bashing going on ever since this whole thing broke?

which is funny because it should be at an all time high, what with the meeting of the Chinese president Xi and Obama.

maybe they're sharing tips on how best to spy on and kill their own citizens! it is the most important economic and political bilateral relationship in the world, after all.

i kid, i kid.

but seriously, wasn't one of the talking points of the meeting going to be Obama redressing Xi on how the Chinese hack/spy on american companies and citizens' communications?

LOL x 10.

paul• 13 years ago

If the government hasn't done anything wrong, then they shouldn't have anything to hide from us :)

More seriously, some amount of surveillance is probably necessary, but they need to be a lot more open and transparent about it. Secret laws and secret courts are not the stuff a free society is made of.

mtgx3• 13 years ago

Apparently, they do. FISA spying has been found unconstitutional since 2011, but they are keeping it a secret:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/government-says-secret...

This is happening in the "beacon of democracy" of the world.

cinquemb2• 13 years ago

So basically, trying to engage in a debate about such gives something (like the president suggests), that shouldn't have legs to stand on constitutional grounds, is just more fuel for the machine? Good to know.

enraged_camel• 13 years ago

For the record, the only people who see the USA as the "beacon of democracy" are Americans.

I'm not saying this to start a flame war, but to simply point out that the USA is no more democratic than many other Western nations.

(My personal opinion is that the USA is much more of a beacon of imperialism than of democracy. But that's neither here nor there.)

gwgarry• 13 years ago

Time for Americans to wake up to the tyranny they have been subjecting the rest of the world to since WWII. If foreigners don't have rights, then sooner or later those same rules will get applied to Americans. In fact that's already happened, just not on American soil yet.

SCAQTony• 13 years ago

Outrageous! they break the law by violating our fourth amendment and then they launch a "criminal investigation" to punish those that came forward to report the violation.

Secret laws and secret courts are illegal.

downandout• 13 years ago

Governments have a legitimate need for secrecy in some situations. If FBI investigations of white collar crimes were posted on a public website, for example, there would be a dramatic rise in both flights and wire transfers to Belize.

The blame here lies squarely with legislators that have drafted laws that are intentionally worded to give the public a false sense of privacy while enabling agencies like NSA to run amok. We elect these representatives precisely for this reason - they are supposed to protect our rights in situations where we can't. Not only did they create these laws, but they were apparently overseeing the mass-surveillance programs established under them and had no problem with the extraordinary Constitutional violations they enabled. Our own President has come in in strong support of these programs. Whether you voted for him or not, you should not be OK with that.

Every senator or congressman that has anything to do with intelligence oversight, along with those that had anything to do with the drafting of these laws, and all other elected officials that have or will come out in support of these programs, must never be reelected. This, unfortunately, is the only realistic defense that US citizens have against their tyrannical government.

naasking• 13 years ago

Governments have a legitimate need for secrecy in some situations. If FBI investigations of white collar crimes were posted on a public website, for example, there would be a dramatic rise in both flights and wire transfers to Belize.

I think this argument is based on a strawman. The 'secrecy' most people assume and that the government wants is 'keeping secrets indefinitely at their sole discretion'. The 'secrecy' needed by your or any other scenario is merely a time-limited secret, ie. that all information must be released publicly once investigations are completed. The former is intrinsically harmful, the latter shouldn't harm anyone.

martythemaniak• 13 years ago

Out of curiosity, has anyone's opinion of Bradley Manning, Julian Assange or Wikileaks changed over the last few days?

From the previous times the topic has come up, my impression is that this community is more or less whether they're doing good work or not.

shardling• 13 years ago

You've get some editing errors that make your comment hard to parse.

jlgreco3• 13 years ago

@wnight: You have been hellbanned for several days.

venomsnake• 13 years ago

Remove the power to classify long term information from the executive branch and put it into the judicial. It is obvious that it is abusing it currently with classifying everything. If they have to compelling interest to classify something that can jump at least the standard for a warrant.

joelrunyon• 13 years ago

This makes me wonder how we have the balls to go into other countries and yell about all their problems with surveillance & censorship when we do it more & arguably, better than all of them combined.

ig12• 13 years ago

"The law enforcement and security officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly, said the agencies that normally conduct such investigations, including the FBI and Justice Department, were expecting a probe into the leaks to a British and an American newspaper."

So basically the fact the NSA leaker was going to be prosecuted was leaked, how can the the security officials who leaked this piece of information not see the irony ?

khuey2• 13 years ago

The government (especially prosecutors/police) routinely leak information to serve their own ends.

_bfhp6• 13 years ago

Greenwald replies to a Twitter user asking "when do we see the full redacted deck?" "@markskogan @nycsouthpaw You won't - it contains very specific technical NSA means for collection - we'd probably be prosecuted if we did." - https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/343454484917280770

Everyone should be keeping their eye on @ggreenwald's twitter, reveals much about the debate and what's going on with him. He gives bits and pieces of background info..

mpyne12• 13 years ago

Greenwald of all people should just redact and spill it. He's under no legal bar toward publishing that material (OBVIOUSLY, as he's already published TS) and he can simply redact anything he's that worried about.

By Greenwald's own logic I shouldn't have to "just trust him" either, no? Be transparent, spill the beans! Or is there an ulterior motive?

_bfhp6• 13 years ago

The Guardian as a news outlet could be prosecuted/gone after for releasing certain things. It isn't just him making the decisions. On Twitter he seems to express the desire to release as much as he can without earning himself a Disappearance; I feel that once this is all over, he might just release the docs the Guardian won't publish somehow.

jzs• 13 years ago

What is there to investigate? The criminals has clearly been found thanks to the whistleblowers. The whistle blower is the hero while the criminals are NSA and the government for doing such acts against democracy. A democracy needs to be transparent. Otherwise it is a system that you can put no trust in.

python3• 13 years ago

So much for not looking back and only looking forward

pvnick2• 13 years ago

Not surprising. This is an incredibly opaque administration that's prosecuted more whistleblowers under the espionage act than every other administration combined.

The contrast between campaign Obama and president Obama is staggering. One would not be too far off the mark in calling him a liar, as simply an objective observation. I say this as someone who campaigned for him in 2008, which I now regret immensely.

pvnick2• 13 years ago

I wonder how far in the future we'll have to wait before people like Glenn Greenwald become potential drone strike targets...

khuey2• 13 years ago

If he were living in Yemen instead of Brazil it might have already happened.

cenhyperion2• 13 years ago

I'm just hoping that Greenwald doesn't "get in a car crash."

b2spirit• 13 years ago

This was not a leak. It was a dare.

beloch• 13 years ago

1. A small group of people violate the privacy of people everywhere around the world.

2. Another, even smaller group of people violate the privacy of the above group.

3. The first group says, "Hey, trust us. It's for your own good", and then promptly hunts down the second group for being dirty-stinking-traitor-terrorist criminals.

4. Profit?

TheCondor• 13 years ago

Read Top Secret America by Dana Priest. These are among the highest paying government jobs. The strongholds of NSA are in the wealthiest counties in the nation. And we don't even know what they do... I think it's reasonable to call it profiting.

outside1234• 13 years ago

Is it time to start a petition that asks that this leak not be prosecuted?

EdiX• 13 years ago

But google, facebook and microsoft all they never heard of PRISM and no such thing exist, why would there be a criminal probe about a work of fiction?

neaanopri• 13 years ago

This should give a perfect opportunity for mass protests at the trial of whoever did the leak.

Government likely to open criminal probe into NSA leaks

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