Dianne Feinstein Says NSA Phone Records Surveillance Has Thwarted Terrorism, ‘But That’s Classified’

June 7, 2013 by

WASHINGTON — Senate Intelligence Chair Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said Thursday the National Security Agency program collecting domestic phone records has prevented terrorism. But she and other senators briefed on the program refused to delve into details about how it is used.

Feinstein spoke to reporters after the Intelligence Committee held a “highly classified” briefing on the vast NSA program, which Feinstein said had been put together “quickly” after The Guardian’s report on its existence.

Asked whether the program had thwarted any attacks, Feinstein said, “It has, but that’s classified.” She added that “there is a report” about how the program has been used, but didn’t elaborate.

Senior officials from the NSA, the FBI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Justice were all present to explain the surveillance program to 27 senators.

“Members who briefed made comments they were astonished. They didn’t know this was happening,” Feinstein said.

Feinstein and other senators, however, refused to go into details about what the NSA does with phone records after it has collected them. NBC News reported Thursday that the program extends to every phone call in the country, not just those made through Verizon.

Feinstein said she would not discuss concerns that her fellow senators may have raised during the meeting, because “this took place in a classified briefing, and we don’t talk about the substance of it.”

“I try not to comment on the results of a program or its effectiveness,” said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a member of the Intelligence Committee. “I don’t want to be the one that ever compromises any ongoing procedures.” Rubio added that “programs like this have great utility.”

“Programs like this are very sensitive exactly for the reasons why people are outraged by what they’ve heard, because you’re trying to balance the privacy expectations that Americans have with the obligation the federal government has to provide for our national security,” Rubio said.

Rubio would not comment on Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-Ky.) statement that the NSA program was an “assault on the Constitution.” Both Republicans are are potential 2016 presidential contenders.

The secrecy around such massive surveillance programs has for years spurred critics, including Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) to ask the NSA to release the secret court orders permitting their use. He has suggested that it’s impossible to have an honest conversation about surveillance programs like the NSA’s phone records collection when Americans are in the dark about details.

Speaking after the meeting on Thursday, Wyden seemed frustrated that he wasn’t able to discuss the program’s specifics. He would not comment on how he thought the NSA’s phone records collection could be improved.

“That’s thoroughly classified,” Wyden said.

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Obama, in a Shift, to Limit Targets of Drone Strikes

May 23, 2013 by

WASHINGTON — President Obama plans to open a new phase in the nation’s long struggle with terrorism on Thursday by restricting the use of unmanned drone strikes that have been at the heart of his national security strategy and shifting control of them away from the C.I.A. to the military.

In his first major speech on counterterrorism of his second term, Mr. Obama hopes to refocus the epic conflict that has defined American priorities since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and even foresees an unspecified day when the so-called war on terror might all but end, according to people briefed on White House plans.

As part of the shift in approach, the administration on Wednesday formally acknowledged for the first time that it had killed four American citizens in drone strikes outside the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq, arguing that its actions were justified by the danger to the United States. Mr. Obama approved providing new information to Congress and the public about the rules governing his attacks on Al Qaeda and its allies.

A new classified policy guidance signed by Mr. Obama will sharply curtail the instances when unmanned aircraft can be used to attack in places that are not overt war zones, countries like Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. The rules will impose the same standard for strikes on foreign enemies now used only for American citizens deemed to be terrorists.

Lethal force will be used only against targets who pose “a continuing, imminent threat to Americans” and cannot feasibly be captured, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said in a letter to Congress, suggesting that threats to a partner like Afghanistan or Yemen alone would not be enough to justify being targeted.

The standard could signal an end to “signature strikes,” or attacks on groups of unknown men based only on their presumed status as members of Al Qaeda or some other enemy group — an approach that administration critics say has resulted in many civilian casualties. In effect, this appears to be a step away from the less restricted use of force allowed in war zones and toward the more limited use of force for self-defense allowed outside of armed conflict.

In the speech he will give on Thursday at the National Defense University, Mr. Obama will also renew his long-stalled effort to close the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Officials said they would make a fresh push to transfer detainees to home countries and lift the ban on sending some back to Yemen. The president plans to reappoint a high-level State Department official to oversee the effort to reduce the prison population.

The combined actions constitute a pivot point for a president who came to office highly critical of his predecessor, George W. Bush, yet who preserved and in some cases expanded on some of the counterterrorism policies he inherited. Much as Mr. Bush did in 2006 when he acknowledged and emptied secret overseas C.I.A. prisons, Mr. Obama appears intent on countering criticism of his most controversial policies by reorienting them to meet changing conditions.

In his speech, Mr. Obama is expected to reject the notion of a perpetual war with terrorists, envisioning a day when Al Qaeda has been so incapacitated that wartime authority will end. However, because he is also institutionalizing procedures for drone strikes, it does not appear that he thinks that day has come. A Pentagon official suggested last week that the current conflict could continue for 10 to 20 years.

Yet even as he moves the counterterrorism effort to a next stage, Mr. Obama plans to offer a robust defense of a continued role for targeted killings, a policy he has generally addressed only in passing or in interviews rather than in a comprehensive speech. A White House official said he “will discuss why the use of drone strikes is necessary, legal and just, while addressing the various issues raised by our use of targeted action.”

While Mr. Obama may not explicitly announce the shift in drones from the Central Intelligence Agency in his speech, since the agency’s operations remain formally classified, the change underscores a desire by the president and his advisers to balance them with other legal and diplomatic tools. The C.I.A., which has overseen the drone war in the tribal areas of Pakistan and elsewhere, will generally cede its role to the military after a six-month transition period as forces draw down in Afghanistan, officials said.

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Law Requiring Warrants for E-Mail Wins Senate Committee Approval

April 28, 2013 by

A Senate committee today backed sweeping privacy protections requiring the government, for the first time, to get a probable-cause warrant to obtain e-mail and other content stored in the cloud.

The Senate Judiciary Committee approved the package on a voice vote after about 30 minutes of debate, and sent the measure to the Senate floor, where it faces an uncertain future.

The legislation, (.pdf) sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), the committee’s chair, and Michael S. Lee (R-Utah) nullifies a provision of federal law allowing the authorities to acquire a suspect’s e-mail or other stored content from an internet service provider without showing probable cause that a crime was committed if the content is 180 days or older.

Under the current law, the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the government can obtain e-mail without a warrant as long as the data has been stored on a third-party server — the cloud — for 180 days or more. The government only needs to show, often via an administrative subpoena, that it has “reasonable grounds to believe” the information would be useful to an investigation.

Initially, ECPA provided privacy to users, but that privacy protection eroded as technology advanced and people began storing e-mail and documents on servers for longer periods, sometimes indefinitely. The act was adopted at a time when e-mail wasn’t stored on servers for a long time, but instead was held briefly on its way to the recipient’s inbox. E-mail more than 6 months old was assumed abandoned.

“I think Americans are very concerned about unwarranted intrusions into our cyber lives,” Leahy said ahead of the vote.

The bill enjoys backing from a wide range of lobbying interests, from the American Civil Liberties Union to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The Judiciary Committee approved a nearly identical version of the bill in November. But it died a quiet death and, in Washington fashion, mutated into a package granting the public the right to automatically display on their Facebook feeds what they’re watching on Netflix.

What the President Barack Obama administration thinks of the measure is a mixed bag. The Justice Department testified in March at House committee that the 180-day rule “no longer made sense.” (.pdf)

But that doesn’t mean the agency is on board with the change.

“The harder question is how to update those outdated rules and the statute in light of new and changing technologies while maintaining protections for privacy and adequately providing for public safety and other law enforcement imperatives,” said Elana Tyrangiel, an acting assistant attorney general.

And on Thursday, Mary Jo White, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s new chair, wrote the Senate Judiciary Committee that the bill’s passage would hinder the government’s “ability to protect investors.”

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama) said Thursday that federal authorities may simply abandon terrorism cases if they have to spent time comporting with the Fourth Amendment.

“Terrorism cases,” he said during the committee hearing, “may never be followed up on just because of that burden.”

The measure allows the authorities to bypass the warrant requirement for national security issues and emergencies. It also demands that the targets of warrants be immediately notified about the warrant.

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When, And Why, to Call a Bombing ‘Terrorism’

April 16, 2013 by

Not every bombing, no matter how many civilians are killed or how terrifying it is, is terrorism. The Boston Marathon atrocity on Monday afternoon may qualify or it may not. Since the discourse around terrorism in the U.S. is an exceptionally fraught one, here’s how to think through the issue.

Terrorism is not just violence aimed at civilians. Terrorism is violence aimed at civilians with a political objective — most often, designed to cause a spectacle.

The Boston Marathon attack brought violence against civilians: three are dead and over 150 injured, several critically. The bombs were placed near the marathon’s finish line at Copley Square, where banks of video cameras and spectator smartphone caught the race’s end, so it’s safe to say it caused a spectacle. We don’t yet know whether it carried a political objective, and that’s the crucial criterion.

No one — group or individual, foreign or domestic — has taken responsibility for the attack. If and when someone or some group does, it may not be definitive: as last September’s Benghazi attack showed, claims of responsibility are not always genuine. A press conference on Tuesday morning by the Boston investigative team underscored that law enforcement is just beginning to understand what happened 18 hours ago.

If you watched cable news at all yesterday, you saw that the race was on to outpace the evidence. CNN termed the attack terrorism within two hours of the twin blasts. Its reporters speculated that President Obama would as well when he spoke on the event, to insulate himself from political criticisms — only Obama was more circumspect. “We still do not know who did this or why,” he said, “and people shouldn’t jump to conclusions before we have the facts.”

Yet shortly afterward, a White House official who would not speak for the record blast-emailed reporters with a clarification. “Any event with multiple explosive devices — as this appears to be — is clearly an act of terror, and will be approached as an act of terror,” the official said. That turns out to be a distinction with a subtle difference.

“I’m not even getting this debate right now,” says Juliette Kayyem, the former homeland security adviser to Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick. “Terrorism is a very, very scary word. If the president decides not to use it, I’ve got to believe it’s to keep people calm… If it’s just some random crazy guy with no political bent, you don’t want to get tripped up.”

That is, Kayyem explains, there’s a legalistic subtlety at work here. Calling something an “act of terror” is a legally neutral term. “Terrorism” is more problematic: a defense attorney could, for instance, say that Obama prejudiced the investigation by pre-stigmatizing a potential suspect as a terrorist. Notably, for the moment, the FBI, which is leading the Boston investigation, says it’s “too early to establish the cause and motivation” behind the bombing. (After this piece went to press, Obama muddled the waters, saying the FBI was “investigating it as an act of terrorism.”)

Lurking behind this definitional debate is a massive amount of subtext. The word terrorism is neutral as to the identity of the terrorist behind the act. But the association in the United States, nearly twelve years after 9/11, is anything but.

The U.S. committed a lexicographical error in calling the series of military reprisals emerging from 9/11 a War on Terrorism. (Or sometimes War on Terror; it’s not even been a consistent euphemism, nor one that bothers with legal exactitude.) Instead of defining the specific entity behind the 9/11 attacks as the enemy — diffuse as al-Qaida actually is — the War on Terrorism construction created the immediate association that “terrorism” is a euphemism for al-Qaida. It also allowed for a darker association: For some, “terrorism” will equate to an act committed by Muslims, no matter how many pre- and post-9/11 acts of terrorism were committed by non-Muslims. It’s not fair. But it is real.

That association can have dire consequences for innocent Muslims and non-Muslims, both from ignorant fanatics and from law enforcement. One of the biggest sources of speculation in journalism and on social media concerned a Saudi national questioned in the bombing. Yet Boston police commissioner Ed Davis said flatly this morning, “There is no one in custody.” The investigation is just beginning to interview Bostonians.

That’s to be expected: law enforcement has to run down what one investigator called the “voluminous” leads emerging in the hours after the explosions. After reports came through social media about police questioning Arabs who among the thousands running away from the Copley disaster area, people grimly joked that “Running While Arab” is the new “Driving While Black.” Suspicion is not the same thing as evidence; questioning is not the same thing as suspicion; and social media-fueled descriptions are not reliable at underscoring these differences.

Terrorism, ultimately, isn’t just a definitional problem of establishing motive. It’s a case where the meme can overshadow the thing-itself. None of this is a reason to avoid calling terrorism what it is. But it is a reason to avoid labeling the Boston Massacre terrorism before that central fact is established.

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Airport security breach caught on camera

November 28, 2012 by

A passenger at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport says he caught a blatant security breach on his cell phone camera. The passenger with an iPhone was in the cell phone waiting lot when he recorded a woman tossing a bag over a fence to an airport worker.

The bag gets stuck and the worker climbs up to get it, all this unfolding just feet from the runway. One air safety expert wonders what’s in the bag but says that’s not the biggest concern.

“It’s obvious that they’re not concerned that security is going to be on top of them,” Air safety expert Brent Brown says.

He also says it tells him this isn’t the first time this has happened.

The worker was standing next to a Delta Air Lines luggage truck so Delta and airport officials say they are investigating the security breach.
A TSA spokesman says airport perimeter security is not their responsibility, but they are helping with the investigation.

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DHS Advisor and Private Security Consultant Keeps Eye on Social Network Influence in Middle East

September 19, 2012 by

A defamatory anti-Muslim movie made in the United States on YouTube sparked a week of violence across the Middle East, then Friday, threats on two American campuses took over Twitter.

All you need is a cell phone to watch it all unfold and contribute to its momentum.

As an advisory to the Department of Homeland Security and a private security consultant, Mohamed Elibiary helps the United States government deal with the effects of social networks.

He can tell you which places in the world Twitter holds sway over Facebook, and where YouTube is not allowed. He can overlay the power of certain social networks on the maps of certain countries.

Elibiary was born in Dallas, but has relatives in Egypt, and he said social networks have in some ways become more powerful than countries.

“In an information age, the nation state becomes a weaker player, and information and social networks are much more influential in affecting public opinion,” Elibiary said. “Governments are going to become weaker, and social networks are going to become more influential.”

In this week where social misinformation has humbled the power of the United States, Elibiary said one way the U.S. can counteract social networks is by tapping the family networks already in place between Americans and their relatives overseas.

“Everybody has a family member overseas, in Egypt or Yemen, or somewhere in the world,” he said. “Those relatives know the truth about the United States, and they can help strengthen a new kind of communication where the U.S. hasn’t established itself yet.”

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Hillside Man Arrested After FBI Undercover Investigation on Federal Charges for Attempting to Bomb Downtown Chicago Bar

September 17, 2012 by

A Hillside man was arrested Friday evening after he allegedly attempted to detonate what he believed to be car bomb in front of a bar in downtown Chicago, announced Gary S. Shapiro, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; William C. Monroe, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the Chicago office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; and Garry F. McCarthy, Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department.

The arrest of ADEL DAOUD, 18, a U.S. citizen, was the culmination of a rigorous undercover operation during which Daoud developed his attack plans and surveilled and selected a target. Daoud was closely monitored by law enforcement and was offered several opportunities to change his mind and walk away from the supposed attack.

“The explosives that Daoud allegedly attempted to detonate posed no threat to the public. They were inert and had been supplied by undercover law enforcement personnel,” Mr. Shapiro said.

Daoud was charged in a criminal complaint filed today in U.S. District Court with one count of attempt to use of a weapon of mass destruction (explosives) and one count of attempt to damage and destroy a building by means of an explosive. Daoud had an initial appearance today before U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlander Keys. He remains in custody pending a detention and preliminary hearing, which was scheduled for 3 p.m. Monday in federal court. Daoud faces a statutory maximum sentence of life in prison for attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction and a mandatory minimum sentence of five years and a potential maximum of 20 years in prison for attempt to damage or destroy a building by means of an explosive.

According to an affidavit in support of the complaint, beginning in about October 2011, Daoud used e-mail accounts to obtain and distribute material, some of which he purported to author, relating to violent jihad and the killing of Americans.

In about May 2012, two FBI online undercover employees contacted Daoud in response to material Daoud posted online and thereafter exchanged several electronic communications with Daoud. According to the affidavit, during these communications Daoud expressed an interest in engaging in violent jihad, either in the United States or overseas.

The affidavit alleges that, from late May to mid-June 2012, Daoud confirmed his belief in the propriety of killing Americans in a terrorist attack and then began seeking online resources regarding how to carry out an attack.

In about June 2012, Daoud was introduced to a purported cousin of one of the undercover employees, who said he resided in New York and was an operational terrorist. Daoud allegedly expressed an interest in meeting the cousin, who unbeknownst to Daoud was an FBI undercover agent. In the course of his dealings with the undercover agent, Daoud allegedly drafted a list of approximately 29 potential targets, including military recruiting centers, bars, malls, and other tourist attractions in the Chicago area. He then selected, researched and surveilled a target for attack to be carried out with an explosive device supplied by the undercover agent, the affidavit alleges.

About 7:15 p.m. yesterday, Daoud met the undercover agent in Villa Park and they drove to downtown Chicago. During the drive, Daoud led the undercover agent in a prayer that Daoud and the agent succeed in their attack, kill many people, and cause destruction. They entered a parking lot where a Jeep containing the purported explosive device was parked. Daoud then drove the Jeep out of the parking lot and parked the vehicle in front of a bar in downtown Chicago, which was the target that he had previously selected. According to the affidavit, Daoud exited the vehicle and walked to an alley approximately a block away, and in the presence of the undercover agent, attempted to detonate the device by pressing the triggering mechanism. He was then arrested.

This case was investigated by the Chicago FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF), which is comprised of FBI special agents, officers from the Chicago Police Department and representatives from 20 federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. The Justice Department’s National Security Division assisted in the investigation.

The public is reminded that a criminal complaint contains mere allegations. The defendant is presumed innocent and is entitled to a fair trial at which the government has the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

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More spies in U.S. than ever, says ex-CIA officer

May 11, 2012 by

A former top CIA covert officer who ran one of the spy agency’s secret domestic networks says there are now more foreign spies on U.S. soil than at the peak of the Cold War. The former officer, Hank Crumpton, who also served as deputy director of the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center and led the U.S. response to 9/11, speaks candidly to Lara Logan about his life as a spy on 60Minutes, Sunday, May 13at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

As the chief of the CIA’s National Resources Division, the highly-sensitive, secret domestic operation, he conducted counter-intelligence within the U.S. “If you look at the threat that is imposed upon our nation every day, some of the major nation states — China in particular — [have] very sophisticated intelligence operations, very aggressive operations against the U.S.,” says Crumpton. “I would hazard to guess there are more foreign intelligence officers inside the U.S. working against U.S. interests now than even at the height of the Cold War,” he tells Logan. “It’s a critical issue.”

Also critical in Crumpton’s mind is the danger posed by al Qaeda, especially factions operating in North Africa. “I’m particularly concerned about al Qaeda in Yemen, which is fractured as a nation state,” he says. “The Sahel, if you look at al Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb, they pose a threat, and in Somalia. Those are the places I’d be concerned,” says Crumpton.

Crumpton says al Qaeda could make a comeback in Afghanistan if the U.S. withdraws too quickly. The current situation there reminds him of a “Greek tragedy,” he tells Logan. “You’ve got so many mistakes on the U.S. side, and you’ve got a feckless, corrupt government on the Afghan side. I am really more pessimistic now than I’ve been in a long time,” says Crumpton.

The retired spy also tells Logan about the early months in Afghanistan after 9/11, when the U.S. effort to topple the Taliban was led by the CIA and about how two administrations’ failure to let CIA assets kill Osama bin Laden led to the development of predator drones.

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