Free Republic

In June 1981, the Soviet Union began building a huge, nuclear-powered reconnaissance ship specifically designed to sail thousands of miles to the U.S. missile test site at the remote Kwajalein Atoll in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. There, the vessel would sit for months, hoovering up electronic data in order to determine what America’s most secretive weapons could do. But the spy ship Ural, completed in May 1983, sailed only once—from the Baltic shipyard where she was built to her home port of Vladivostok—and never went anywhere near Kwajalein. Hobbled by faulty hardware, cursed with bad luck and starved...

Yesterday “TheBlaze” published an interview with Romanian Lt. Gen Ion Pacepa, a discussion which arose around the publishing of his work, “Disinformation: Former Spy Chief Reveals Secret Strategies for Undermining Freedom, Attacking Religion, and Promoting Terrorism.” Pacepa is a defector to the United States, but not just any run-of-the-mill defector. He is the highest-ranking Soviet intelligence officer to ever defect. He crossed over back in 1978 and was given political asylum by then President Jimmy Carter. He has made a practice since that time to write in defense of freedom while living his life under threat of assassination, hiding out...

He [Snowden] states that his “breaking point” was “seeing Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, directly lie under oath to Congress” denying the existence of a domestic spying programs while under questioning in March of last year. Mr. Snowden goes on to state that, “The public had a right to know about these programs. The public had a right to know that which the government is doing in its name, and that which the government is doing against the public.” Read more: http://benswann.com/media-blacks-out-new-snowden-interview-the-government-doesnt-want-you-to-see/#ixzz2sSdnMVhn Follow us: @BenSwann_ on Twitter

A court in Jerusalem has sentenced an Israeli man to four-and-a-half years in prison for offering to spy for Iran. Yitzhak Bergel, 46, pleaded guilty to charges of contacting a foreign agent, intent to commit treason and attempting to aid an enemy of Israel. But the court ruling noted that "no damage had been done to the state". Bergel belongs to the anti-Zionist Neturei Karta, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect which is vehemently opposed to the State of Israel's existence. Its members believe a Jewish state can only be established by the Messiah.

During the 1980s with no end of the Cold War in sight, the CIA became alarmed at the number of Soviet spies working for the U.S. who were being arrested and executed. The U.S. network of informants within the USSR was rapidly being dismantled, severely damaging American intelligence gathering capabilities. It became apparent that the CIA had a mole who was compromising their efforts. Based on the book Circle of Treason by former CIA agent Sandy Grimes, the ABC series The Assets dramatizes the events and investigation leading to the arrest of traitor Aldrich Ames. The show is a grim...

MKs demand Pollard's release after revelations that US conducted surveillance on former PMs Barak, Olmert. A chorus of politician from across the political spectrum called for the release of Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard on Sunday, after leaked NSA documents revealed the US has been tracking the e-mails of former Israeli leaders. Documents leaked by fomer National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden revealed that the United States was spying on the e-mails of former prime minister Ehud Olmert and former defense minister Ehud Barak between the years 2008-2009. Knesset speaker Yuli Edelstein (Likud Beytenu) assailed Washington for “hypocrisy,” saying that...

This is ‘very grave if true,’ says senior MK, calling it ‘classic espionage’ that Israel would not carry out against the US US intelligence not only spied on then-defense minister Ehud Barak’s offices during 2008-2009, but also maintained an apartment opposite Barak’s primary residence for that purpose, according to a report on Sunday, which came amid new revelations of the extent of US and British intelligence activity against Israel and other allies. In 2007, Israeli intelligence noted that the US government had rented an apartment across the street from Barak’s high-rise apartment in Tel Aviv, and observed “sizable amounts of...

Reuters reports that the NSA paid massive computer security firm RSA $10 million to promote a flawed encryption system so that the surveillance organization could wiggle its way around security. In other words, the NSA bribed the firm to leave the back door to computers all over the world open. Thanks to documents leaked by Edward Snowden, we already knew the NSA played a central role in promoting a flawed formula for generating random numbers, which if used in encryption, essentially gives the spies easy access to computing systems. A piece of RSA software, bSafe, became the most significant vector...

It's a secret agent's dream: one single piece of software that lets you into all of a 'target's communications, their movements and their personal notes. But this isn't some piece of top-secret NSA infrastructure. mSpy is a smartphone app that works on Android, Apple, Blackberry and Nokia phones - offering a staggering array of surveillance options. The app - which works on a subscription basis starting at £24.99 a month - is described as being able to 'run undetected on your child's or employee's cell phone and provide all of the necessary features for complete monitoring.'

The MI6 spy found dead in a bag three years ago probably locked himself in the holdall and died as a result of a tragic accident, Scotland Yard has said. Outlining the results of a three-year investigation on Wednesday, the Metropolitan police said Gareth Williams most likely died alone in his flat. But Detective Assistant Commissioner Martin Hewitt said the police could not "fundamentally and beyond doubt" rule out the possibility that a third party was involved in his death. Williams's naked body was found in the padlocked bag, with the keys discovered under his body, in the otherwise empty...

How does that geo-location work? Devices in the network's coverage area are "heard" by more than one radio in those APs (the off-white boxes). Once the network hears a device from multiple APs, it can compare the strength and timing of the signal to locate where the device is. This is classic triangulation, and users of Aruba's AirWave software—as in the Cabela's example—report that their systems are able to locate devices to within a few feet.

Secretary of State John Kerry surprised many reporters, as well as intelligence, law enforcement and military officials, when he conceded on Friday that some of the U.S. surveillance has gone “too far.” The Obama administration has come under intense criticism from many world leaders including some heads of state from NATO allies, according to Josh Hollander, a former intelligence-division police detective. Responding to increased questioning by major news organizations, Secretary Kerry admitted that at times the technological surveillance by the super-secret National Security Agency (NSA) “have reached too far.” However, Kerry quickly alluded to the Obama claim of ignorance when...

<p>Rome — US secret services allegedly eavesdropped on cardinals before the conclave in March to elect a new pope, Italian weekly magazine Panorama claimed Wednesday.</p> <p>"The National Security Agency wiretapped the pope," the magazine said, accusing the United States of listening in to telephone calls to and from the Vatican, including the accommodation housing cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio before he was elected Pope Francis.</p>

I've always thought of Barack Obama as the "Chauncey Gardiner" of American politics. Like Peter Sellers' character in the classic film, "Being There," Obama is an embodiment of outsiders' hopes and dreams for who they think he is. Reality, like the film, shows there isn't really a lot of there, there.This weekend, we learned that President Obama "didn't know about" NSA spying on world leaders, especially German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He also "didn't know about" the posthumously obvious problems with the rollout of the ObamaCare website exchanges. According to the New York Times, these problems were evident 8 months ago....

FRANCE has demanded an explanation from Washington of a report that the US swept up 70 million French telephone records and text messages in its global surveillance net, even recording certain private conversations. The fallout prompted a phone call yesterday from US President Barack Obama to French President Francois Hollande, and, the White House said, an acknowledgement by the US leader that the episode raised "legitimate questions for our friends and allies" about how surveillance capabilities are employed. Mr Hollande's office issued a strongly worded statement afterward expressing "profound reprobation" over US actions it said intruded on the private lives...

Moscow (AFP) - US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden warned of dangers to democracy in the first video released of the fugitive since Russia granted him temporary asylum in August. "If we can't understand the policies and programmes of our government we can't grant our consent in regulating them," Snowden said in one of the short video clips posted on the WikiLeaks website Friday night. The anti-secrecy group said the videos were filmed Wednesday when Snowden met with a group of four retired US ex-intelligence workers and activists now seeking to promote ethics within the profession. Snowden, a former National Security...

It certainly makes for a good story: a scrappy kid from Baltimore flunks out of an English class at what is now Loyola University Maryland only to become an international bestselling author. The problem is that the oft-told tale concerning Tom Clancy is just as fictitious as Jack Ryan. “It was an urban legend that just wouldn’t die,” said Carol Abromaitis, the English professor accused of giving Clancy an F in her class. For decades, Abromaitis urged English majors to let others know the truth. Her efforts bore little fruit. “One major said to me, ‘Of course not. It makes...

Iran claimed on Tuesday that Israel's arrest of an alleged Iranian spy was a "repetitive scenario" aimed at ending what it called the Jewish state's "isolation" within the international community. "This is a repetitive scenario by the Zionist regime. Even Western media said the timing of the arrest and [Prime Minister Binyamin] Netanyahu's leaving (for the U.S.) was a plan to end its isolation," foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham was quoted by AFP as having said in her weekly press briefing. "Such desperate scenarios stem from anger, and we cannot assess them," Afkham said, adding that Israel was also isolated...

SAO PAULO | Sun Sep 8, 2013 12:06pm EDT (Reuters) - The U.S. government allegedly spied on Brazilian state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA, known as Petrobras, according to the web site of Globo, Brazil's biggest television network. The network, which a week ago aired a report alleging that the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted communications by the presidents of Brazil and Mexico, said its information again came from Glenn Greenwald, an American activist who has worked with fugitive former NSA analyst Edward Snowden to expose the extent of U.S. spying at home and abroad. Promotional teasers from the network...

FORT MEADE, Maryland-A U.S. military judge on Tuesday started considering the sentence of soldier Bradley Manning for the largest leak of classified information in the country's history - and she said it will be announced Wednesday morning.