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Oops. At least they were found and returned.
Keith Vaz MP, chairman of the powerful Home Affairs select committee told the BBC: “Such confidential documents should be locked away…they should not be read on trains.”
You think?
An article from The Washington Post:
Federal authorities hope N-DEx will become what one called a “one-stop shop” enabling federal law enforcement, counterterrorism and intelligence analysts to automatically examine the enormous caches of local and state records for the first time.
[…]
The expanding police systems illustrate the prominent roles that private companies play in homeland security and counterterrorism efforts. They also underscore how the use of new data—and data surveillance—technology to fight crime and terrorism is evolving faster than the public’s understanding or the laws intended to check government power and protect civil liberties, authorities said.
Three decades ago, Congress imposed limits on domestic intelligence activity after revelations that the FBI, Army, local police and others had misused their authority for years to build troves of personal dossiers and monitor political activists and other law-abiding Americans.
Since those reforms, police and federal authorities have observed a wall between law enforcement information-gathering, relating to crimes and prosecutions, and more open-ended intelligence that relates to national security and counterterrorism. That wall is fast eroding following the passage of laws expanding surveillance authorities, the push for information-sharing networks, and the expectation that local and state police will play larger roles as national security sentinels.
Law enforcement and federal security authorities said these developments, along with a new willingness by police to share information, hold out the promise of fulfilling post-Sept. 11, 2001, mandates to connect the dots and root out signs of threats before attacks can occur.
My guess is that it’s the Chinese government.
This article from The Wall Street Journal outlines how the NSA is increasingly engaging in domestic surveillance, data collection, and data mining. The result is essentially the same as Total Information Awareness.
According to current and former intelligence officials, the spy agency now monitors huge volumes of records of domestic emails and Internet searches as well as bank transfers, credit-card transactions, travel and telephone records. The NSA receives this so-called “transactional” data from other agencies or private companies, and its sophisticated software programs analyze the various transactions for suspicious patterns. Then they spit out leads to be explored by counterterrorism programs across the U.S. government, such as the NSA’s own Terrorist Surveillance Program, formed to intercept phone calls and emails between the U.S. and overseas without a judge’s approval when a link to al Qaeda is suspected.
[…]
Two former officials familiar with the data-sifting efforts said they work by starting with some sort of lead, like a phone number or Internet address. In partnership with the FBI, the systems then can track all domestic and foreign transactions of people associated with that item—and then the people who associated with them, and so on, casting a gradually wider net. An intelligence official described more of a rapid-response effect: If a person suspected of terrorist connections is believed to be in a U.S. city—for instance, Detroit, a community with a high concentration of Muslim Americans—the government’s spy systems may be directed to collect and analyze all electronic communications into and out of the city.
The haul can include records of phone calls, email headers and destinations, data on financial transactions and records of Internet browsing. The system also would collect information about other people, including those in the U.S., who communicated with people in Detroit.
The information doesn’t generally include the contents of conversations or emails. But it can give such transactional information as a cellphone’s location, whom a person is calling, and what Web sites he or she is visiting. For an email, the data haul can include the identities of the sender and recipient and the subject line, but not the content of the message.
Intelligence agencies have used administrative subpoenas issued by the FBI—which don’t need a judge’s signature—to collect and analyze such data, current and former intelligence officials said. If that data provided “reasonable suspicion” that a person, whether foreign or from the U.S., was linked to al Qaeda, intelligence officers could eavesdrop under the NSA’s Terrorist Surveillance Program.
[…]
The NSA uses its own high-powered version of social-network analysis to search for possible new patterns and links to terrorism. The Pentagon’s experimental Total Information Awareness program, later renamed Terrorism Information Awareness, was an early research effort on the same concept, designed to bring together and analyze as much and as many varied kinds of data as possible. Congress eliminated funding for the program in 2003 before it began operating. But it permitted some of the research to continue and TIA technology to be used for foreign surveillance.
Some of it was shifted to the NSA—which also is funded by the Pentagon—and put in the so-called black budget, where it would receive less scrutiny and bolster other data-sifting efforts, current and former intelligence officials said. “When it got taken apart, it didn’t get thrown away,” says a former top government official familiar with the TIA program.
Two current officials also said the NSA’s current combination of programs now largely mirrors the former TIA project. But the NSA offers less privacy protection. TIA developers researched ways to limit the use of the system for broad searches of individuals’ data, such as requiring intelligence officers to get leads from other sources first. The NSA effort lacks those controls, as well as controls that it developed in the 1990s for an earlier data-sweeping attempt.
Barry Steinhardt of the ACLU comments:
I mean, when we warn about a “surveillance society,” this is what we’re talking about. This is it, this is the ballgame. Mass data from a wide variety of sources—including the private sector—is being collected and scanned by a secretive military spy agency. This represents nothing less than a major change in American life—and unless stopped the consequences of this system for everybody will grow in magnitude along with the rivers of data that are collected about each of us—and that’s more and more every day.
More commentary.
So, you’re sitting around the house with your buddies, playing World of Warcraft. One of you wonders: “How can we get paid for doing this?” Another says: “I know; let’s pretend we’re fighting terrorism, and then get a government grant.”
Having eliminated all terrorism in the real world, the U.S. intelligence community is working to develop software that will detect violent extremists infiltrating World of Warcraft and other massive multiplayer games, according to a data-mining report from the Director of National Intelligence.
Another article.
You just can’t make this stuff up.
EDITED TO ADD (3/13): Funny.
In “Underlying Reasons for Success and Failure of Terrorist Attacks: Selected Case Studies” (Homeland Security Institute, June 2007), the authors examine eight recent terrorist plots against commercial aviation and passenger rail, and come to some interesting conclusions.
From the “Executive Summary”:
The analytic results indicated that the most influential factors determining the success or failure of a terrorist attack are those that occur in the pre-execution phases. While safeguards and controls at airports and rail stations are critical, they are most effective when coupled with factors that can be leveraged to detect the plot in the planning stages. These factors include:
- Poor terrorist operational security (OPSEC). The case studies indicate that even plots that are otherwise well-planned and operationally sound will fail if there is a lack of attention to OPSEC. Security services cannot “cause” poor OPSEC, but they can create the proper conditions to capitalize on it when it occurs.
- Observant public and vigilant security services. OPSEC breaches are a significant factor only if they are noticed. In cases where the public was sensitive to suspicious behavior, lapses in OPSEC were brought to the attention of authorities by ordinary citizens. However, the authorities must likewise be vigilant and recognize the value of unexpected information that may seem unimportant, but actually provides the opening to interdict a planned attack.
- Terrorist profile indicators. Awareness of and sensitivity to behavioral indicators, certain activities, or past involvement with extremist elements can help alert an observant public and help a vigilant security apparatus recognize a potential cell of terrorist plotters.
- Law enforcement or intelligence information sharing. Naturally, if security services are aware of an impending attack they will be better able to interdict it. The key, as stated above, is to recognize the value of information that may seem unimportant but warrants further investigation. Security services may not recognize the context into which a certain piece of information fits, but by sharing with other organizations more parts of the puzzle can be pieced together. Information should be shared laterally, with counterpart organizations; downward, with local law enforcement, who can serve as collectors of information; and with higher elements capable of conducting detailed analysis. Intelligence collection and analysis are relatively new functions for law enforcement. Training is a key element in their ability to recognize and respond to indicators.
- International cooperation. Nearly all terrorist plots, including most of those studied for this project, have an international connection. This could include overseas support elements, training camps, or movement of funds. The sharing of information among allies appears from our analysis to have a positive impact on interdicting attack plans as well as apprehending members of larger networks.
I especially like this quote, which echos what I’ve been saying for a long time now:
One phenomenon stands out: terrorists are rarely caught in the act during the execution phase of an operation, other than instances in which their equipment or weapons fail. Rather, plots are most often foiled during the pre-execution phases.
Intelligence, investigation, and emergency response: that’s where we should be spending our counterterrorism dollar. Defending the targets is rarely the right answer.
If there’s a debate that sums up post-9/11 politics, it’s security versus privacy. Which is more important? How much privacy are you willing to give up for security? Can we even afford privacy in this age of insecurity? Security versus privacy: It’s the battle of the century, or at least its first decade.
In a Jan. 21 New Yorker article, Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell discusses a proposed plan to monitor all—that’s right, all—internet communications for security purposes, an idea so extreme that the word “Orwellian” feels too mild.
The article (now online here) contains this passage:
In order for cyberspace to be policed, internet activity will have to be closely monitored. Ed Giorgio, who is working with McConnell on the plan, said that would mean giving the government the authority to examine the content of any e-mail, file transfer or Web search. “Google has records that could help in a cyber-investigation,” he said. Giorgio warned me, “We have a saying in this business: ‘Privacy and security are a zero-sum game.'”
I’m sure they have that saying in their business. And it’s precisely why, when people in their business are in charge of government, it becomes a police state. If privacy and security really were a zero-sum game, we would have seen mass immigration into the former East Germany and modern-day China. While it’s true that police states like those have less street crime, no one argues that their citizens are fundamentally more secure.
We’ve been told we have to trade off security and privacy so often—in debates on security versus privacy, writing contests, polls, reasoned essays and political rhetoric—that most of us don’t even question the fundamental dichotomy.
Security and privacy are not opposite ends of a seesaw; you don’t have to accept less of one to get more of the other. Think of a door lock, a burglar alarm and a tall fence. Think of guns, anti-counterfeiting measures on currency and that dumb liquid ban at airports. Security affects privacy only when it’s based on identity, and there are limitations to that sort of approach.
Since 9/11, approximately three things have potentially improved airline security: reinforcing the cockpit doors, passengers realizing they have to fight back and—possibly—sky marshals. Everything else—all the security measures that affect privacy—is just security theater and a waste of effort.
By the same token, many of the anti-privacy “security” measures we’re seeing—national ID cards, warrantless eavesdropping, massive data mining and so on—do little to improve, and in some cases harm, security. And government claims of their success are either wrong, or against fake threats.
The debate isn’t security versus privacy. It’s liberty versus control.
You can see it in comments by government officials: “Privacy no longer can mean anonymity,” says Donald Kerr, principal deputy director of national intelligence. “Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguard people’s private communications and financial information.” Did you catch that? You’re expected to give up control of your privacy to others, who—presumably—get to decide how much of it you deserve. That’s what loss of liberty looks like.
It should be no surprise that people choose security over privacy: 51 to 29 percent in a recent poll. Even if you don’t subscribe to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, it’s obvious that security is more important. Security is vital to survival, not just of people but of every living thing. Privacy is unique to humans, but it’s a social need. It’s vital to personal dignity, to family life, to society—to what makes us uniquely human—but not to survival.
If you set up the false dichotomy, of course people will choose security over privacy—especially if you scare them first. But it’s still a false dichotomy. There is no security without privacy. And liberty requires both security and privacy. The famous quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin reads: “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” It’s also true that those who would give up privacy for security are likely to end up with neither.
This essay originally appeared on Wired.com.
This story made the rounds in European newspapers about ten years ago—mostly stories in German, if I remember—but it wasn’t covered much here in the U.S.
For half a century, Crypto AG, a Swiss company located in Zug, has sold to more than 100 countries the encryption machines their officials rely upon to exchange their most sensitive economic, diplomatic and military messages. Crypto AG was founded in 1952 by the legendary (Russian born) Swedish cryptographer Boris Hagelin. During World War II, Hagelin sold 140,000 of his machine to the US Army.
“In the meantime, the Crypto AG has built up long standing cooperative relations with customers in 130 countries,” states a prospectus of the company. The home page of the company Web site says, “Crypto AG is the preferred top-security partner for civilian and military authorities worldwide. Security is our business and will always remain our business.”
And for all those years, US eavesdroppers could read these messages without the least difficulty. A decade after the end of WWII, the NSA, also known as No Such Agency, had rigged the Crypto AG machines in various ways according to the targeted countries. It is probably no exaggeration to state that this 20th century version of the “Trojan horse” is quite likely the greatest sting in modern history.
We don’t know the truth here, but the article lays out the evidence pretty well.
See this essay of mine on how the NSA might have been able to read Iranian encrypted traffic.
This kind of thinking can do enormous damage to a free society:
As Congress debates new rules for government eavesdropping, a top intelligence official says it is time that people in the United States change their definition of privacy.
Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguard people’s private communications and financial information.
[…]
“Our job now is to engage in a productive debate, which focuses on privacy as a component of appropriate levels of security and public safety,” Kerr said. “I think all of us have to really take stock of what we already are willing to give up, in terms of anonymity, but [also] what safeguards we want in place to be sure that giving that doesn’t empty our bank account or do something equally bad elsewhere.”
Anonymity, privacy, and security are intertwined; you can’t just separate them out like that. And privacy isn’t opposed to security; privacy is part of security. And the value of privacy in a free society is enormous.
EDITED TO ADD (11/15): His actual comments are more nuanced. Steve Bellovin has some comments.
This article is a detailed writeup of the actual investigation. While it seems that intercepted emails were instrumental at several points during the investigation, the article doesn’t explain whether the intercepts were the result of some of the wholesale eavesdropping programs or specifically obtained for this case.
The US intelligence agencies, the NSA and CIA, provided the most important information: copies of messages between German Islamists and their contacts in Pakistan. Three people in Germany were apparently the ones maintaining contact. The first was a man with the pseudonym “Muaz,” who investigators suspected was Islamist Attila S., 22. The second was a man named “Zafer,” from the town of Neunkirchen, who they believed was Zafer S., an old friend of Daniel S., one of the three men arrested last week. According to his father, Hizir S., Zafer is currently attending a language course in Istanbul. The third name that kept reappearing in the emails the NSA intercepted was “Abdul Malik,” a.k.a. Fritz Gelowicz, who prosecutors believe was the ringleader of the German cell, a man Deputy Secretary Hanning calls “cold-blooded and full of hate.”
[…]
While at the Pakistani camp in the spring of 2006, Adem Y. and Gelowicz probably discussed ways to secretly deliver messages from Pakistan to Germany. They used a Yahoo mailbox, but instead of sending messages directly, they would store them in a draft folder through which their fellow Islamists could then access the messages. But it turned out that the method they hit upon had long been known as an al-Qaida ploy. The CIA, NSA and BKA had no trouble monitoring the group’s communications. Two men who went by the aliases “Sule” or “Suley” and “Jaf” kept up the contact from the IJU side.
This is also interesting, given the many discussions on this blog and elsewhere about stopping people watching and photographing potential terrorist targets:
Early in the evening of Dec. 31, 2006, a car containing several passengers drove silently past the Hutier Barracks in Lamboy, a section of the western German city of Hanau. Hanau is known as the home of a major US military base, where thousands of US soldiers live and routinely look forward to celebrating New Year’s Eve in their home away from home. The BfV’s observation team later noted that the car drove back and forth in front of the barracks several times. When German agents finally stopped the car, they discovered that the passengers were Fritz Gelowicz, Attila S. from the southern city of Ulm, Ayhan T. from Langen near Frankfurt and Dana B., a German of Iranian descent from Frankfurt who, when asked what he and the others were doing there, claimed that they had just wanted to see “how the Americans celebrate New Year’s Eve.”
Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.