NSA phone records story excites Washington(Trying to take down Michael Hayden)

Chicago Tribune ^ | 11 May 2006 | Frank James at 1:10 pm CDT

[dirtboy]

You do not understand what is done. Their is no surveilance being done, only analysis of phone calling patterns.

I understand it just fine. I work with marketing databases for a living and understand what is being done far better than the average bear.

What happened is the fedgov asked for phone records they have no business having, and telecom companies handed over data they had no business handing over. There is no probable cause in the entire calling list for Verizon.

This sort of stuff could be done for PhD dissertations or studies in a number of different fields with absolutely no problem or issue of privacy.

A PhD candidate does not have the power to arrest and imprison people.

[dirtboy]

People Search, Business Search, Reverse Phone, Reverse Address, Area Codes, Mailing lists....

Do any of those provide information on who has called whom?

[dirtboy]

They analyze traffic patterns, and if needed, apply for a warrent to listen in.

They have NO BUSINESS having that data in the first place, and the phone companies had no business giving it to them. It is telling that Qwest refused and the feds did not resort to legal action to pressure them, as they did with Google to get search data.

[joonbug]

Agree. Credit card companies have far more personal information on Americans than the NSA does.

Funny how government can only encroach on civil liberties when a Republican is in the White House. Just like the premise that only white people can be racists.

[dirtboy]

There is no entry or search involved.

No search? Compiling a list of my private phone calls is NO SEARCH?

Here's a copy of the Bill of Rights, since you are low on toilet paper.

[TommyDale]

If you are not calling Osama and his boys, you have nothing to worry about.

[tallhappy]

Your responses are incredibly illogical.

What happened is the fedgov asked for phone records they have no business having, and telecom companies handed over data they had no business handing over.

You should sue the telecom companies then and see how far you get.

[DakotaRed]

Ho hum, slow news day?

In their continual effort to undermine Bush and the War on Terror, we now have the latest "leak" of programs designed to seek out and neutralize our enemies here at home.

Dims really want power back bad to actually try to make us lose another war.

[demlosers]

If I'm a moron you're an idiot. Your ad hominem attacks have successfully taken down the IQ level on this thread.

[dirtboy]

Your responses are incredibly illogical.

No, your response shows just how far down the slippery slope some former conservatives have slid. If Clinton did this, you would be all over it.

You should sue the telecom companies then and see how far you get.

Oh, I won't sue them. I will change companies.

[dirtboy]

If you are not calling Osama and his boys, you have nothing to worry about.

Funny, I never saw that caveat in the Bill of Rights. I must re-read it sometime.

[tallhappy]

Compiling a list of my private phone calls is NO SEARCH?

What is being searched?

[Glenn]

Your ad hominem attacks have successfully taken down the IQ level on this thread.

Quoting the party line does you no good with me, Ace.

You were presenting apples to support oranges. I suspect you know that. Try to hold your hysteria for matters you are correct about.

[Ben Mugged]

In recent years, the FBI and other government agencies have investigated Amdocs more than once. The firm has repeatedly and adamantly denied any security breaches or wrongdoing. But sources tell Fox News that in 1999, the super secret national security agency, headquartered in northern Maryland, issued what's called a Top Secret sensitive compartmentalized information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United States were getting into foreign hands - in Israel, in particular.

Investigators don't believe calls are being listened to, but the data about who is calling whom and when is plenty valuable in itself. An internal Amdocs memo to senior company executives suggests just how Amdocs generated call records could be used. "Widespread data mining techniques and algorithms.... combining both the properties of the customer (e.g., credit rating) and properties of the specific 'behavior.'" Specific behavior, such as who the customers are calling.

The Amdocs memo says the system should be used to prevent phone fraud. But U.S. counterintelligence analysts say it could also be used to spy through the phone system. Fox News has learned that the N.S.A has held numerous classified conferences to warn the F.B.I. and C.I.A. how Amdocs records could be used. At one NSA briefing, a diagram by the Argon national lab was used to show that if the phone records are not secure, major security breaches are possible.

From Fox News 13 December 2001. Link http://www.rense.com/general18/isr2.htm

[dirtboy]

What is being searched?

My calls, you maroon. What if the FBI entered my home without a warrant and without probable cause and took my phone and logged the numbers I had logged on my caller ID. Would you be so apologizing for them for that?

Gawd, what have you people become that you cannot understand basic rights any longer?

[Lowell]

I also have a collection of American phone numbers, it's called a phone book.

They have the numbers but don't even know who owns them.

[dirtboy]

I also have a collection of American phone numbers, it's called a phone book.

Do you have records of calls?

That's the kind of utterly brainless and irrelevant talking point we saw during the Clinton years. It's frightening that conservatives are using such now.

[mcvey]

DB:

You are perfectly correct. This data base can be used for blackmail and extortion by the government at an incredible level.

I know that no one at FR has ever had an affair or tried to keep a serious illness quiet or even had an unlisted number to keep unwanted interests from calling you, but it does happen. In the hands of the wrong people, this would be a source of an absolutely unlimited growth of authority through the threat of revelation or simply the ability to track anyone and their financial transactions. (By the way, I do not think this in the hand of the wrong people.)

This needs, however, to be balanced against our need for security. The president has the clear authority to do this in time of great danger, just as Lincoln had the clear authority to watch the mails during the Civil War. The answer to how we balance the two is a political decision. I fear that with the MSM and the present set of ‘rats we will not have the debate we need.

But I also have been amazed, and not pleasantly so, about the president’s refusal to go to the country at nighttime and discuss the truly great issues we face with the American people. Presidents can overcome the MSM, but not if they don’t make the effort. I know that Bush is best when talking to a crowd, but such can be arranged. Nixon, not the greatest speaker, addressed the nation from the Oval Office 34 times and managed to carry the day in all but a few instances. Bush has done about as little as can be done regarding educating the people. In this way, he has behaved very much like the senior Bush and, just as the senior Bush became the plaything of the MSM, so has the junior Bush.

McVey

[Political Junkie Too]

What about analyzing TCP/IP traffic clusters between computer nodes without looking at the contents of the packets? Would that be analogous to analyzing phone number traffic without listening to the calls? Do you all think the government is analyzing internet traffic? Do you have a problem with that?

-PJ

[mcvey]

But what if it isn't people with good intentions. Suppose you had been a friend of Ken Starr's? What could have happened to you.