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Snowden leaks: UK has secret Middle-East web surveillance base collecting emails, phone calls and web traffic
Image: Edward Snowden
BY DUNCAN CAMPBELL , OLIVER WRIGHT, JAMES CUSICK, KIM SENGUPTA – 23 August 2013
Britain runs a secret Middle East-based listening post collecting vast quantities of emails, telephone calls and web traffic on behalf of Western intelligence agencies.
The station is able to tap into and extract data from the underwater fibre-optic cables passing through the region.
The information is then processed for intelligence and passed to GCHQ in Cheltenham and shared with the National Security Agency (NSA) in the United States. The Government claims the station is a key element in the West’s “war on terror” and provides a vital “early warning” system for potential attacks around the world.
The Independent is not revealing the precise location of the station but information on its activities was contained in the leaked documents obtained from the NSA by Edward Snowden. The Guardian newspaper’s reporting on these documents in recent months has sparked a dispute with the Government, with GCHQ security experts overseeing the destruction of hard drives containing the data.
The Middle East installation is regarded as particularly valuable by the British and Americans because it can access submarine cables passing through the region. All of the messages and data passed back and forth on the cables is copied into giant computer storage “buffers” and then sifted for data of special interest.
Information about the project was contained in 50,000 GCHQ documents that Mr Snowden downloaded during 2012. Many of them came from an internal Wikipedia-style information site called GC-Wiki. Unlike the public Wikipedia, GCHQ’s wiki was generally classified Top Secret or above.
The disclosure comes as the Metropolitan Police announced it was launching a terrorism investigation into material found on the computer of David Miranda, the Brazilian partner of The Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald – who is at the centre of the Snowden controversy.
Scotland Yard said material examined so far from the computer of Mr Miranda was “highly sensitive”, the disclosure of which “could put lives at risk”.
The Independent understands that The Guardian agreed to the Government’s request not to publish any material contained in the Snowden documents that could damage national security.
As well as destroying a computer containing one copy of the Snowden files, the paper’s editor, Alan Rusbridger, agreed to restrict the newspaper’s reporting of the documents.
The Government also demanded that the paper not publish details of how UK telecoms firms, including BT and Vodafone, were secretly collaborating with GCHQ to intercept the vast majority of all internet traffic entering the country. The paper had details of the highly controversial and secret programme for over a month. But it only published information on the scheme – which involved paying the companies to tap into fibre-optic cables entering Britain – after the allegations appeared in the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. A Guardian spokeswoman refused to comment on any deal with the Government.
A senior Whitehall source said: “We agreed with The Guardian that our discussions with them would remain confidential”.
But there are fears in Government that Mr Greenwald – who still has access to the files – could attempt to release damaging information.
He said after the arrest of Mr Miranda: “I will be far more aggressive in my reporting from now. I am going to publish many more documents. I have many more documents on England’s spy system. I think they will be sorry for what they did.”
One of the areas of concern in Whitehall is that details of the Middle East spying base which could identify its location could enter the public domain.
The data-gathering operation is part of a £1bn internet project still being assembled by GCHQ. It is part of the surveillance and monitoring system, code-named “Tempora”, whose wider aim is the global interception of digital communications, such as emails and text messages.
Across three sites, communications – including telephone calls – are tracked both by satellite dishes and by tapping into underwater fibre-optic cables.
Access to Middle East traffic has become critical to both US and UK intelligence agencies post-9/11. The Maryland headquarters of the NSA and the Defence Department in Washington have pushed for greater co-operation and technology sharing between US and UK intelligence agencies.
The Middle East station was set up under a warrant signed by the then Foreign Secretary David Miliband, authorising GCHQ to monitor and store for analysis data passing through the network of fibre-optic cables that link up the internet around the world
The certificate authorised GCHQ to collect information about the “political intentions of foreign powers”, terrorism, proliferation, mercenaries and private military companies, and serious financial fraud.
However, the certificates are reissued every six months and can be changed by ministers at will. GCHQ officials are then free to target anyone who is overseas or communicating from overseas without further checks or controls if they think they fall within the terms of a current certificate.
The precise budget for this expensive covert technology is regarded as sensitive by the Ministry of Defence and the Foreign Office.
However, the scale of Middle East operation, and GCHQ’s increasing use of sub-sea technology to intercept communications along high-capacity cables, suggest a substantial investment.
Intelligence sources have denied the aim is a blanket gathering of all communications, insisting the operation is targeted at security, terror and organised crime.
12 year-old NSA spying system revealed that catches 75 percent of US Internet traffic
August 21st, 2013 by Sarah A. Downey
NSA companiesLooks like the NSA lied.
The Wall Street Journal’s Siobhan Gorman and Jennifer Valentino-Devries broke the story this morning that the NSA’s systems can access about 75% of all Internet traffic in the US. Not only that, but it can save the content of emails and Internet phone calls sent from one US citizen to another.
The revelation contradicts previous NSA statements, including some by NSA Director James Clapper, that the NSA doesn’t intercept the actual contents of emails and other communications, and that the NSA doesn’t intercept purely domestic (US to US) traffic.
The surveillance programs, with whimsical code names including “Blarney, Fairview, Oakstar, Lithium and Stormbrew,” collect and filter information directly from US telecommunications companies, including AT&T and Verizon. Major companies like Cisco, Boeing, and Juniper provide the gear to build the systems.
Similar to PRISM, the spying program Edward Snowden revealed that lets government analysts access data from web companies like Google and Facebook, these programs only work because they integrate directly with wireless and Internet providers. Once again, private companies are demonstrated to power the surveillance that feeds the government.
Clapper NSA memeThe government can spy on people “reasonably believed” to be outside the US, which is a low legal bar and easy standard to meet. But NSA officials admit that many of the communications they intercept and store are actually between US citizens, and thousands of other serious surveillance errors happen each year.
The program is largely secret and regulates itself. Civil rights and privacy activists argue that the NSA should have better, more public oversight.
The fallout from 2013′s “Summer of Snowden” has been widespread. Analysts estimate that newfound distrust in US data companies will cost $180 billion, although privacy companies like us and DuckDuckGo have seen major growth in the number of people using our tools. President Obama’s approval rating has dropped, especially among young voters between 18 and 29. Last week, the President announced plans to reform NSA programs to better protect privacy.
On a final note, you can’t stop the NSA from tracking you, but you can make it harder. Here’s how.
...The Obama administration just revived one of the worst provisions in SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act).
The Commerce Dept's Internet Policy Task Force has proposed making it a felony to stream copyrighted content (aka Section 201 of SOPA). Interpreted broadly, this proposal would apply to anyone who puts copyrighted music in the background of their YouTube video or uploads a video of themselves covering a song without permission -- which means, under these rules, Justin Bieber would be a felon.
Even sharing a video of your friend's embarassing karoake performance or your family singing "Happy Birthday To You" could put you in jail! Click here to fight back.
This is all because the federal government wants to make streaming -- including material which falls under the "public performance" category -- punishable by years in prison.
Jail time for streaming videos? Tell the Obama administration: NO!
Obama apparently hasn't been paying attention the past two years: The American people don't want SOPA-style internet censorship or to open the door for more prosecutorial abuse. Period.
We've stopped them before -- from SOPA to PIPA to CISPA -- and we can stop them again.
Tell Obama: we still won't stand for SOPA-style censorship. ...
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...I was stunned by the experience of hearing the voices and seeing the video of these places and people from my past.Examples of this would be the many family/personal audio/video recordings that people may have made over the years.
It is amazing how clear the memories become of the people and places when aided by a bit of video, and how quickly it transports you back in time to those days, and how much information comes back to mind when looking at these videos.
...As boring as it might be to watch now, in 30 years those boring moments may become the most precious valuable things you can imagine.-mouser (July 09, 2013, 08:00 AM)
...So while this is different to mouser's post, we share similar experiences and good thoughts.Examples of this would be many, and could include @fredemeister's audio-video recordings of his mother-in-law, and audio recordings my brother made (using a Dictaphone) of aged relatives talking about various things.
Just my 2c worth, but I strongly recommend doing this before it's too late.-fredemeister (August 17, 2013, 07:52 PM)
..."I have been running around in my newsroom, screaming about this ... for years," says Julia Angwin, who covers computer security and privacy at The Wall Street Journal. "There's so much evidence now that journalists are being targeted, that our communications are vulnerable and, mostly, that our sources are being put in jail."
...It's in this context that The New York Times decided to outsource its email to Google. This summer, the paper moved all of its reporters onto corporate Gmail accounts. Before the switch, Times emails were stored on servers it owned; now those messages are in Google's digital filing cabinet.
...Fred Cate, the director of the Center for Applied Cybersecurity Research at Indiana University, says a large email service provider like Google may very well offer better security. Still, Cate says, when it comes to mounting a legal defense against a leak investigation, the Times is making itself vulnerable.
..."There will be a gap. There is no question that there's going to be a gap," Cate says. "Because previously you would have had to serve that piece of paper on The New York Times."
Now, an investigator would serve Google. And if the request comes with a gag order, the Times might never know.
Delingpole on shale
Aug 17, 2013 Energy: gas Royal Society
James Delingpole has a perceptive piece on shale gas and the parallels with Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged:One of the things she foresaw was the current nonsensical, dishonest, canting campaign against shale gas. In Atlas Shrugged it takes the form of Rearden Metal, the miracle technology which is going to transform the US economy if only the progressives will let it. But of course, Rand’s fictional progressives don’t want Reardon Metal to succeed any more than their modern, real-life equivalents want shale gas to succeed. Why not? For the same rag-bag of made-up, disingenuous reasons which progressives have used to justify their war on progress since time immemorial: it’s unfair, it uses up scarce resources, it might be dangerous. Rand doesn’t actually use the phrase “the precautionary principle.” But this is exactly what she is describing in the book when various vested interests – the corporatists in bed with big government, the politicised junk-scientists at the Institute of Science (aka, in our world, the National Academy of Sciences or the Royal Society), the unions – try to close down the nascent technology using the flimsiest of excuses.Although it has been pointed out that the Royal Society have been broadly supportive of shale developments, the parallels that James points out are rather striking.
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Read the whole thing
...They were updating the NSA's backdoor is my call...SNAP! An almost exact same thought occurred to me - and probably a million other people on the planet, upon reading of this news.-wraith808 (August 17, 2013, 09:31 AM)
Btw, I'm still amazed by wiznote. It's one of my reasons to stay on windows, even though there are significant downsides... killer app.-urlwolf (August 10, 2013, 01:45 PM)
...This experience has taught me one very important lesson: without congressional action or a strong judicial precedent, I would _strongly_ recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States.An odd thing to say. Why say it? What he recommends was patently obvious from the moment the Guardian published the Snowden leaks. And it's not necessarily confined to just those with physical ties to the United States, either.-wraith808 (August 08, 2013, 06:27 PM)
BTW IainB - CleverCat is a SHE!Oops, sorry. I had no idea...-CleverCat (August 10, 2013, 03:13 AM)
Archiver for Gmail is a script that will seamlessly analyze your inbox and move all the big attachments to your Google drive.
NEW STUFF:
* Super simple, super cool new "one-button-mode"
* Archiver for GMail has now automatic/copying background features to copy attachments!!
* After some feedback on the poor documentation of the functions I added some labels to each field to disclose what it actually does!
* Uninstall instructions are embedded in the app (also including the instructions on how to remove the annoying apps script emails).
The script will also save an html copy of the whole thread, so that you are good to delete every email containing big attachments (this can be even done automatically). Finally, all the messages containing relevant attachments will be labelled, so that you can index your inbox even better.
...I'd like to do my best to help English users to know and to use wiznote better.-xbeta (July 25, 2013, 09:24 AM)
